Sonnet XVII
I thought that I’d post something different today, so I decided to put my favorite poem on my blog.
It’s called “Sonnet XVII,” and it’s my absolute favorite poem written by my favorite poet, Pablo Neruda. I really admire him as a writer, because his writings are diverse, yet all come out really, really well. He could have an amazing love poem (like this one) and have an equally magnificent politically-inclined work. If you have the time, do check his writings out. I’m sure you’ll love these, especially if you’re into poetry.
Sonnet XVII
(Translated by Stephen Mitchell)
I don’t love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz or
arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as certain dark things are loved,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul. I
love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom and carries
hidden within itself the light of those flowers,
and thanks to your love, darkly in my body
lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I don’t know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.
August 28th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
Ooooh. I love those kinds of poems!
Have you read, “tonight I can write the saddest lines” or something like that XD I love that.
September 3rd, 2007 at 8:30 am
Yes, We studied that in poetry class, actually.:)
Here is a translated version of it.
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, “The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.”
The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.
Through nights like this one I held her in my arms
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.
She loved me sometimes, and I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.
What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered and she is not with me.
This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.
The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.
I no longer love her, that’s certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.
Another’s. She will be another’s. Like my kisses before.
Her voide. Her bright body. Her inifinite eyes.
I no longer love her, that’s certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.
Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
my sould is not satisfied that it has lost her.
Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.