“We have turned the ‘love bonds’ between nature and man into ‘ropes,’ we have ‘mocked’ the bounds of the human and the natural. We have become a ‘cunning generation’ that, moreover, is proud of being just that. Thus one no longer sees the earth, no longer hears the cry of the bird, and language among men has ‘withered.’ All this…is the ‘night of the gods.’ This means, therefore, the loss of the immanent significance and radiating power of worldly, human relationships…it is up to the poet to raise this entire lost world to life again. If he can do no more than recall that which has been lost, then he is a ‘poet in a needy age.’” RS
