Abishag - Analysis

Introduction

Rainer Maria Rilke's "Abishag" records an intimate, quiet scene charged with erotic tension and mortality. The tone moves between tender, almost reverential description and a growing sense of failure or insufficiency. Mood shifts from sensuous warmth in the first stanza to reflective frustration and longing in the second.

Relevant background

Written by a poet steeped in late 19th–early 20th-century modernist sensibilities, the poem reflects Rilke's interests in inner life, existential isolation, and eros as a metaphysical force. The biblical name Abishag evokes the nursemaid who attends King David in old age, bringing a framing of power, decline, and sexual symbolism.

Main themes: Eros, mortality, and impotence

The poem intertwines eros and mortality: the young woman's physical presence is warm, alive, and attentive, while the old man is repeatedly characterized as withering, dim, or cooling. Rilke develops these themes through contrast: the "long sweet hours" and "fragrance" versus the "withering old man" and "cooling of the King." A third theme, impotence or unfulfillment, emerges when the king recognizes her unmoved mouth and that the "comet green / Of her desired reached not to where he lay," signaling desire that fails to consummate.

Recurring imagery and symbols

Abishag herself functions as a potent symbol of youthful vitality, sensuality, and perhaps hope; her body is described as a constellation, breasts like a "quiet constellation," making physicality cosmic and luminous. Night motifs—owl screech, curtain stirring, "night of nights"—connect nocturnal mystery with desire and fear. The image of the king as a cooling, withered body and as one who "listened like a hound" evokes animal instincts and diminishing agency. The comet image suggests a brilliant but misplaced longing: beauty and attraction are visible but fail to bridge the gulf.

Close reading of tone and point of view

The poem's close, observational point of view lets us feel both the descriptive tenderness toward Abishag and the internal fracture of the king. The language shifts from passive reception—she "lay, and serving-men her lithe arms took"—to active interiority—he "sought himself in his remaining blood"—marking a movement from external scene to internal crisis.

Conclusion

Rilke's "Abishag" compresses a poignant drama of desire thwarted by time: youth and sensual care cannot resurrect or fully unite with a decaying authority. The poem leaves an ambivalent, haunting image—an embrace that comforts yet also reveals the limits of eros in the face of mortality.