# Rainer Maria Rilke's most famous poems

Rilke's best-known poems, found in school books, anthologies and birthday cards, from The Panther to the Duino Elegies.

- 0 votes · 15 items
- Aug 21, 2025 · Johanna Winkler
- https://even.best/en/l/2536/rainer-maria-rilke-s-most-famous-poems

## Top 15

1. **The Panther** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1902. The most famous "thing poem", written at the Jardin des Plantes.
2. **Autumn Day** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1902. The great summer ends and autumn begins.
3. **Love Song** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — One of the most beautiful love poems in German.
4. **Archaic Torso of Apollo** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1908. It ends by telling you to change your life.
5. **You Don't Have to Understand Life** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1898. The birthday-card poem.
6. **The Carousel** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1906. Children in the Luxembourg Gardens and a white elephant.
7. **Autumn (The leaves are falling)** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Falling leaves and a hand that holds everything.
8. **I Live My Life in Widening Circles** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — From The Book of Hours.
9. **Duino Elegies (First Elegy)** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Begun in 1912 at Duino, finished in 1922.
10. **Sonnets to Orpheus** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — 1922. Written in a few days.
11. **Roman Fountain** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — A fountain in the Villa Borghese as a "thing poem".
12. **Solemn Hour** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Whoever weeps somewhere in the world right now…
13. **Blue Hydrangea** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — The colours of a fading flower.
14. **Childhood** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — Memories of school and long afternoons.
15. **The Man Watching** (0 · ▲0 ▼0) — How small the things we struggle with.

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.