can you hear my heart racing from where you are? God, I love that man. Yeah, I know he’s dead and everything…details, details, but I remember the very first time I read his work - it was the first time I had my Spanish poet cherry popped. I was a high school freshman; wide-eyed and ridiculously impressionable, but damn his words sang to me so softly and so sweetly, like nectar that drips from the tips of a honey bee’s wings.
I was far too immature to really fully comprehend and understand Mr. Neruda’s deep passion, but I remember reading and falling madly in love with his odes to simple things. And his love of nature spoke to me - nature girl here - surfing nearly every morning before school, riding my bike everywhere, or just sitting on the beach and letting the sun kiss me all over, while the sea-salt wind tossled my long, blond hair.
Anyway, I recall the goose-pimpled flesh I instantly felt after reading his words. I also remember looking at my boyfriend at the time and wondering, “why don’t you write things to me just like Mr. Neruda writes? I would pur like a kitten (meow) all the time if you did.”
I wonder if that’s what I’m still searching for in a partner? Is my perfect lover one that can write poetry for me like Pablo Neruda? What do you think? Is that aiming too high? Do you think my expectations are unrealistic? Be honest. Here’s a quicky first date conversation with me and my potential Pablo Neruda writer:
Me: Can you write?
Them: Yes.
Me: Good. No, scratch that, great!
Them: sips on alcoholic beverage and thinks about ordering a shot while hoping and praying this grilling session will lead to hot sex.
Me: Okay, next question. Do you know who Pablo Neruda is/was?
Them: Shakes head in a YES.
Me: You do? Yah!
Them: rolls eyes and wonders if all this questioning will ultimately lead to hot sex.
Me: Okay…here’s the next and final question. Do you think you could pretty please write a love poem for me like Neruda?
Them: Silence.
Me: Check please.
Of course I’m joking here. Sort of.
I’m sure you’re wondering why in the world I have this major hard-on for Pablo Neruda right now? Legitimate question. Part of my culture assignments in la classe de Espanol is to write a poem using Mr. Neruda style as a outline. Oooh, la, la. I’m thrilled for the challenge and while everyone else in class was grumbling about having to write a poem, I was secretly cartwheeling inside. I’m not much of a poet (not at all actually), but this is quite an honor and it gives me the opportunity to revist one of my truly favorite poets of all time. After all, it’s Pablo Neruda that has set the dating bar for me -
Now, you know you’re not going to get out of this blog post without a reference to a film, right? Please, I beg of you to rent the film, Il Postino, which is based on Neruda’s life when he lived on a remote Island off the coast of Italy after he was exiled from Chile. It’s simply a gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous film:
I’m off to write a poem Neruda would be proud of -
Neve Black
*swwwwwwwwwwwwwwoooooooooooooooooon* nuff said.
Oh I know. Be my guest and swoon away…he was just down-right delicious of a man.
You have wonderful taste, Neve. I love Pablo Neruda. One of my favorites:
Here I Love You
Here I love you.
In the dark pines the wind disentangles itself.
The moon glows like phosphorous on the vagrant waters.
Days, all one kind, go chasing each other.
The snow unfurls in dancing figures.
A silver gull slips down from the west.
Sometimes a sail. High, high stars.
Oh the black cross of a ship.
Alone.
Sometimes I get up early and even my soul is wet.
Far away the sea sounds and resounds.
This is a port.
Here I love you.
Here I love you and the horizon hides you in vain.
I love you still among these cold things.
Sometimes my kisses go on those heavy vessels
that cross the sea towards no arrival.
I see myself forgotten like those old anchors.
The piers sadden when the afternoon moors there.
My life grows tired, hungry to no purpose.
I love what I do not have. You are so far.
My loathing wrestles with the slow twilights.
But night comes and starts to sing to me.
The moon turns its clockwork dream.
The biggest stars look at me with your eyes.
And as I love you, the pines in the wind
want to sing your name with their leaves of wire.
Sonnet XVII (I do not love you…)
I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way
than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.
Oops… I posted two poems. Sorry– was copying and pasting from my own blog. They’re both awesome, though!
I was not familiar with him but just read a poem Kristina Wright posted on Facebook while linking to this post, and I found it gorgeous.
Regarding standards…it doesn’t seem to me you should eschew any of your standards. What seems important to me is a true experiencing of each moment, so that if you encountered someone who did not meet what you thought were your standards but with whom you felt a connection beyond them, that you would be true to that experience and not allow a rigidity of or fixation on standards interfere. Does that make sense? That’s how it seems to me.
So there’s nothing the matter with having the standards, as long as a focus or fixation on them does not preclude something that may be bigger — and that is not to say, by the way, that the standards wouldn’t be met. Perhaps they would indeed! Just that sometimes, we may not know what we even want, because when something is offered us it is beyond what we could have known or imagined.
Hugs and all best to you.
Love,
Em
Hi Kristina!
Thank you for this. I tell you…he stirs something in me like no other. I already have an unusual fascination with all things Spanish and I’m inches away from booking a trip to Chile…so each time I re-read him, or my path leads me back to him, it’s as if I’m reading him for the first time all over again.
May the spirit of Neruda continue to flourish in all of us -
Hi Em,
You’re such a sweetie-pie, really. Thank you for making me think in terms of seeing the larger picture. I hear and know exactly what you’re saying as it relates to my standards.
Hey, you never know…maybe I’ll meet Neruda’s incarnate living here in Cleveland while gallery hopping, or attending a reading. Crazier things have happened, right?
My husband was in Chile last year… oh, it looked like a wonderful place for an adventure!
Hi Kristina,
Oh, now I’m green with envy about your husband’s trip to S. America. I’ve traveled through Europe and all through the U.S. I’ve done some Mexico, but the Southern hemispher is a place that truly begs for adventure, don’t you think?