"I cannot discuss your verses; for any attempt at criticism would be foreign to me... With this note as a preface, may I just tell you that your verses have no style of their own"
Thought this was pretty funny, although I may have misunderstood. Regardless, I loved this piece.
I think I know what Rilke was trying to say, because of "Understanding Comics" by Scott McCloud. McCloud has a series of components of craft, from the superficial aspects of a comic to the abstract storytelling behind it. He says that people often begin by paying attention to the superficial ("I want to draw ${character} just like the artist does") but end up paying attention to the abstract ("wow, this Homer dude had a knack for characterisation and pacing, several thousand years ago").
So I think Rilke was saying he won't attempt criticism (won't talk about technical details such as rhythm or structure or vocabulary) because none of that matters until the poet has something to communicate (has found their voice, a style of their own) in their poetry.
For an athlete, it might be that it's not useful attempting criticism of the finer points of their checking technique ("keep your elbow further in during a shoulder check") if they haven't yet figured to skate to where the puck is going ("skating to where the puck has been" being equivalent to paying too much attention to what outsiders are saying).
Returning to the comics metaphor, imagine if Rilke were trying to nicely say "these model sheets you've sent are technically slick, but they all look like Marvel characters ... what do your characters look like?"
(at which point I guess Rule 63 might be the equivalent of the poetry exercise in the sibling thread: it constrains a lot of decisions as to style, tone, etc. yet the gender swap forces one to make decisions of one's own)
The insolence of offering critique... it is quite an encouragement though and probably really good advice for writing. Although the adressant probably just threw that out the window for a few minutes after getting this response from Rilke.
Thought this was pretty funny, although I may have misunderstood. Regardless, I loved this piece.