To be loved means to be consumed. To love is to give light with inexhaustible oil. To be loved is to pass away, to love is to endure.
– -Rilke and Benvenuta: an Intimate Correspondence
In marriage, the point is not to achieve a rapid union by tearing down and toppling all boundaries. Rather, in a good marriage each person appoints the other to be guardian of his solitude and thus shows him the greatest faith he can bestow.
— Rainer Maria Rilke The Poet’s Guide to Life (trans. Ulrich Baer)