Pablo Neruda was a Latin American (Chile) poet with an international reputation, who was also committed to politics and social reform. Often referred to as the "poet of enslaved humanity," he was awarded the Lenin peace prize in 1953 and the Nobel prize for literature in 1971
below are some small samplings of his poetic work:
In the Night we shall go in
In the night we shall go in,
we shall go in to steal
a flowering, flowering branch.
We shall climb over the wall
in the darkness of the alien garden,
two shadows in the shadow.
Winter is not yet gone,
and the apple tree appears
suddenly changed into
a fragment of cascade stars.
In the night we shall go in
up to its trembling firmament,
and your hands, your little hands
and mine will steal the stars.
And silently to our house
in the night and the shadow,
perfume's silent step,
and with starry feet,
the clear body of spring.
The Weary One
The weary one, orphan
of the masses, the self,
the crushed one, the one made of concrete,
the one without a country in crowded restaurants,
he who wanted to go far away, always farther away,
didn't know what to do there, whether he wanted
or didn't want to leave or remain on the island,
the hesitant one, the hybrid, entangled in himself,
had no place here: the straight-angled stone,
the infinite look of the granite prism,
the circular solitude all banished him:
he went somewhere else with his sorrows,
he returned to the agony of his native land,
to his indecisions, of winter and summer.
Tower of Light
O tower of light, sad beauty
that magnified necklaces and statues in the sea,
calcareous eye, insignia of the vast waters, cry
of the mourning petrel, tooth of the sea, wife
of the Oceanian wind, O separate rose
from the long stem of the trampled bush
that the depths, converted into archipelago,
O natural star, green diadem,
alone in your lonesome dynasty,
still unattainable, elusive, desolate
like one drop, like one grape, like the sea.
You will remember
You will remember that leaping stream
where sweet aromas rose and trembled,
and sometimes a bird, wearing water
and slowness, its winter feathers.
You will remember those gifts from the earth:
indelible scents, gold clay,
weeds in the thicket and crazy roots,
magical thorns like swords.
You'll remember the bouquet you picked,
shadows and silent water,
bouquet like a foam-covered stone.
That time was like never, and like always.
So we go there, where nothing is waiting;
we find everything waiting there.
Don't go far off
Don't go far off, not even for a day, because --
because -- I don't know how to say it: a day is long
and I will be waiting for you, as in an empty station
when the trains are parked off somewhere else, asleep.
Don't leave me, even for an hour, because
then the little drops of anguish will all run together,
the smoke that roams looking for a home will drift
into me, choking my lost heart.
Oh, may your silhouette never dissolve on the beach;
may your eyelids never flutter into the empty distance.
Don't leave me for a second, my dearest,
because in that moment you'll have gone so far
I'll wander mazily over all the earth, asking,
Will you come back? Will you leave me here, dying?
We are the clumsy passersby
We are the clumsy passersby, we push past each other with elbows,
with feet, with trousers, with suitcases,
we get off the train, the jet plane, the ship, we step down
in our wrinkled suits and sinister hats.
We are all guilty, we are all sinners,
we come from dead-end hotels or industrial peace,
this might be our last clean shirt,
we have misplaced our tie,
yet even so, on the edge of panic, pompous,
sons of bitches who move in the highest circles
or quiet types who don't owe anything to anybody,
we are one and the same, the same in time's eyes,
or in solitude's: we are the poor devils
who earn a living and a death working
bureautragically or in the usual ways,
sitting down or packed together in subway stations,
boats, mines, research centers, jails,
universities, breweries,
(under our clothes the same thirsty skin),
(the hair, the same hair, only in different colors).
Love
Because of you, in gardens of blossoming flowers I ache from the
perfumes of spring.
I have forgotten your face, I no longer remember your hands;
how did your lips feel on mine?
Because of you, I love the white statues drowsing in the parks,
the white statues that have neither voice nor sight.
I have forgotten your voice, your happy voice; I have forgotten
your eyes.
Like a flower to its perfume, I am bound to my vague memory of
you. I live with pain that is like a wound; if you touch me, you will
do me irreparable harm.
Your caresses enfold me, like climbing vines on melancholy walls.
I have forgotten your love, yet I seem to glimpse you in every
window.
Because of you, the heady perfumes of summer pain me; because
of you, I again seek out the signs that precipitate desires: shooting
stars, falling objects.
Ode to Sadness
Sadness, scarab
with seven crippled feet,
spiderweb egg,
scramble-brained rat,
bitch's skeleton:
No entry here.
Don't come in.
Go away.
Go back
south with your umbrella,
go back
north with your serpent's teeth.
A poet lives here.
No sadness may
cross this threshold.
Through these windows
comes the breath of the world,
fresh red roses,
flags embroidered with
the victories of the people.
No. No entry.
Flap your bat's wings,
I will trample the feathers
that fall from your mantle,
I will sweep the bits and pieces
of your carcass to
the four corners of the wind,
I will wring your neck,
I will stitch your eyelids shut,
I will sew your shroud,
sadness, and bury your rodent bones
beneath the springtime of an apple tree.
ALGUNAS BESTIAS
Era el crepúsculo de la iguana.
Desde la arcoirisada crestería
su leengua como un dardo
se hundía en la verdura,
el hormiguero monacal pisaba
con melodioso pie la selva,
el guanaco fino como el oxigeno
en las anchas alturas pardas
iba calzando botas de oro,
mientras la llama abria cándidos
ojos en la delicadeza
del mundo lleno de rocio.
Los monos trenzaban un hilo
interminablemente erótico
en las riberas de la aurora,
derribando muros de polen
y espantando el vuelo violeta
de las mariposas de Muzo
Era la noche de los caimanes,
la noche pura y pululante
de hocicos saliendo del légamo,
y de las ciénagas soñolientas
un ruido opaco de armaduras
volvía al origen terrestre.
El jaguar tocaba las hojas
con su ausencia fosforescente,
el puma corre en el ramaje
como el fuego devorador
mientras arden en él los ojos
alcohólicos de la selva.
Los tejones rascan los pies
del río, husmean el nido
cuya delicia palpitante
atacarán con dientes rojos.
Y en el fondo del agua magna,
como el círulo de la tierra,
está la gigante anaconda
cubierta de barros rituales,
devoradora y religiosa.
SOME BEASTS
It was the nightfall of the iguana
from his rainbow-colored crest
his tongue like a dart
sank into the greenery
The monastic ant colony stepped
with musical feet through the jungle.
The wild llama, as delicate as oxygen
in the wide brown high country
went walking in his golden boots
while the tame llama opened
his candid eyes onto the daintiness
of a world filled with dew.
The monkeys braided
an endless erotic thread
along the shores of daybreak
bringing down walls of pollen
and frightening the violet flight
of butterflies on the river.
It was the night of the alligators
the pure, pulsing night
of snouts sticking out of slime
and from the drowsy swamps
the dull noise of scale armor
goes back to the origin of the earth.
The jaguar touched the leaves
with his glowing absence.
The puma runs through the thicket
like a devouring fire
while in him are burning
the alcoholic eyes of the jungle.
Badgers are scrabbling the banks
of the river, sniffing at a nest
full of living delicacies
which they will attack with red teeth.
And in the depth of the great water
like the circle of the earth
is the giant anaconda
covered with ceremonial paint,
devouring and religious.
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