strange, not to go on wishing one's wishes

True, it is strange to inhabit the earth no longer,
to use no longer customs squarely acquired,
not to interpret roses, and other things
that promise so much, in terms of a human future;
to be no longer all that one used to be
in endlessly anxious hands, to lay aside
even one's proper name like a broken toy.
Strange, not to go on wishing one's wishes.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke, from the First Elegy, Duino Elegies, translated by JB Leishman and Stephen Spender