Pablo Neruda (1904-1973), Chilean Poet, and Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971

[DonRocks]

On 8/19/2016 at 3:49 PM, Rieux said:

Also, try to get out to Valparaiso if you can. It's beautiful in a gritty street art way and you can stop at one of Neruda's houses on the way there. 

Pablo Neruda won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971. Gabriel García Márquez once called Neruda "the greatest poet of the 20th century in any language" (I understand such hyperbole isn't definitive, but coming from someone such as Márquez, it must at least be taken seriously).

Here's a personal favorite of mine:

Your Feet

When I cannot look at your face 
I look at your feet. 
Your feet of arched bone, 
your hard little feet. 
I know that they support you, 
and that your sweet weight 
rises upon them. 
Your waist and your breasts, 
the doubled purple 
of your nipples, 
the sockets of your eyes 
that have just flown away, 
your wide fruit mouth, 
your red tresses, 
my little tower. 
But I love your feet 
only because they walked 
upon the earth and upon 
the wind and upon the waters, 
until they found me. 

[Josh]

This was read at my wedding.  The last stanza always gives me a little hitch in my breath.

Sonnet XVII

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.