Introducing
Your new presentation assistant.
Refine, enhance, and tailor your content, source relevant images, and edit visuals quicker than ever before.
Trending searches
FONTS
This can be interpreted as the simplest and most erotically charged of all of Neruda's poems. He is simply stating his lust for the flesh and his desire for his lover. However, upon deeper thought, one can see that there is a double meaning to the poem.
In the first stanza, Neruda describes a woman's curves, the act of sex itself and, finally, birth. At second glance, it can be argued that Neruda described his love for Chile. The white hills and thighs being the landscape of Chile, the world lying in surrender being the sense of peace and tranquility and the aforementioned act of birth now simply an act of farming.
Cuerpo de mujer, blancas colinas, muslos blancos,
te pareces al mundo en tu actitud de entrega.
Mi cuerpo de labriego salvaje te socava
y hace soltar el hijo del fondo de la tierra
Fui solo como un túnel. De mí huían los pájaros,
y en mí la noche entraba su invasión poderosa.
Para sobrevivirme te forjé como un arma,
como una flecha en mi arco, como una piedra en mi honda.
Pero cae la hora de la venganza, y te amo.
Cuerpo de piel, de musgo, de leche ávida y firme.
Ah, los vasos del pecho! Ah, los ojos de ausencia!
Ah, las rosas del pubis! Ah, tu voz lenta y triste!
Cuerpo de mujer mía, persistiré en tu gracia.
Mi sed, mi ansia sin límite, mi camino indeciso!
Oscuros cauces donde la sed eterna sigue,
y la fatiga sigue, y el dolor infinito.
Body of a woman, white hills, white thighs,
you look like a world, lying in surrender.
My rough peasant's body digs in you
and makes the son leap from the depth of the earth.
I was alone like a tunnel. The birds fled from me,
and night swamped me with its crushing invasion.
To survive myself I forged you like a weapon,
like an arrow in my bow, a stone in my sling.
But the hour of vengeance falls, and I love you.
Body of skin, of moss, of eager and firm milk.
Oh the goblets of the breast! Oh the eyes of absence!
Oh the roses of the pubis! Oh your voice, slow and sad!
Body of a woman, I will persist in your grace.
My thirst, my boundless desire, my shifting road!
Dark river-beds where the eternal thirst flows
and weariness follows, and the infinite ache.
The second stanza better describes his love for a woman as it's about his feelings of isolation. Seeing as he hadn't been exiled yet and couldn't have felt separated from Chile. The second stanza describes how he felt before he met his lover. He felt alone and swathed in darkness and when his love appeared in his life, he clung to her to reclaim his happiness.
The rest of the poem can, again, be taken in two different ways, lover and country. Neruda describes skin and land, milk and crops. The last two lines are purely sexual where Neruda relishes in his desires towards his lover.
The final stanza, much like the first presents dual imagery where Neruda could be yearning for his country or lover, describing the body of a woman and the qualities of Chile. The dark river beds being either literal or breasts in which he takes solace in. His weariness and infinite ache in the last line describes his desire for indulgence whethere it be in lover or country.
Pablo Neruda, born Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto, was a legendary Chilean poet whose works ranged from political manifestos to love poems filled with eroticism.
Although it was Neruda's second published work, "Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair" was what pushed him into fame. Even though its sexual themes were controversial at the time, it was widely acclaimed.
How terrible and brief was my desire of you!
How difficult and drunken, how tensed and avid.
Cemetery of kisses, there is still fire in your tombs,
still the fruited boughs burn, pecked at by birds.
Oh the bitten mouth, oh the kissed limbs,
oh the hungering teeth, oh the entwined bodies.
Oh the mad coupling of hope and force
in which we merged and despaired.
And the tenderness, light as water and as flour.
And the word scarcely begun on the lips.
This was my destiny and in it was my voyage of my longing,
and in it my longing fell, in you everything sank!
Oh pit of debris, everything fell into you,
what sorrow did you not express, in what sorrow are you
not drowned!
From billow to billow you still called and sang.
Standing like a sailor in the prow of a vessel.
You still flowered in songs, you still broke the currents.
Oh pit of debris, open and bitter well.
Pale blind diver, luckless slinger,
lost discoverer, in you everything sank!
It is the hour of departure, the hard cold hour
which the night fastens to all the timetables.
The rustling belt of the sea girdles the shore.
Cold stars heave up, black birds migrate.
Deserted like the wharves at dawn.
Only the tremulous shadow twists in my hands.
Oh farther than everything. Oh farther than everything.
It is the hour of departure. Oh abandoned one!
Mi deseo de ti fue el más terrible y corto,
el más revuelto y ebrio, el más tirante y ávido.
Cementerio de besos, aún hay fuego en tus tumbas,
aún los racimos arden picoteados de pájaros.
Oh la boca mordida, oh los besados miembros,
oh los hambrientos, dientes, oh los cuerpos trenzados.
Oh la cópula loca de esperanza y esfuerzo
en que nos anudamos y nos desesperamos.
Y la ternura, leve como el agua y la harina.
Y la palabra apenas comenzada en los labios.
Ese fue mi destino y en él viajó mi anhelo,
y en él cayó mi anhelo, todo en ti fue naufragio!
Oh, sentina de escombros, en ti todo caía,
qué dolor no exprimiste, qué dolor no te ahoga!
De tumbo en tumbo aún llamaste y cantaste.
De pie como un marino en la proa de un barco.
Aún floreciste en cantos, aún rompiste en corrientes.
Oh sentina de escombros, pozo abierto y amargo.
Pálido buzo ciego, desventurado hondero,
descubridor perdido, todo en ti fue naufragio!
Es la hora de partir, la dura y fría hora
que la noche sujeta a todo horario.
El cinturón ruidoso del mar ciñe la costa.
Surgen frías estrellas, emigran negros pájaros.
Abandonado como los muelles en el alba.
Sólo la sombra trémula se retuerce en mis manos.
Ah más allá de todo. Ah más allá de todo.
Es la hora de partir. Oh abandonado!
Neruda, in contrast with the other twenty poems takes a much more somber tone in lieu of the song of despair. His woe and anguish for losing the one that he loved is heavily accentuated along with deep imagery that pulls you into Neruda's agonized mind for a few brief second. The reader can almost feel the same hollowness and grip of depression as Neruda.
The reader can gradually see the downward slope starting from the first poem to the 20th and finally The Song of Despair. You live through Neruda's best moments and his seeming heaven all the way to his worst moments in what seemed to be a pit of darkness.
The memory of you emerges from the night around me.
The river mingles its stubborn lament with the sea.
Deserted like the wharves at dawn.
It is the hour of departure, oh deserted one!
Cold flower heads are raining over my heart.
Oh pit of debris, fierce cave of the shipwrecked.
In you the wars and the flights accumulated.
From you the wings of the song birds rose.
You swallowed everything, like distance.
Like the sea, like time. In you everything sank!
It was the happy hour of the assault and the kiss.
The hour of the spell that blazed like a lighthouse.
Pilot's dread, fury of blind driver,
turbulent drunkenness of love, in you everything sank!
In the childhood of mist my soul, winged and wounded.
Lost discoverer, in you everything sank!
You girdled sorrow, you clung to desire,
sadness stunned you, in you everything sank!
I made the wall of shadow draw back,
beyond desire and act, I walked on.
Oh flesh, my own flesh, woman whom I loved and lost,
I summon you in the moist hour, I raise my song to you.
Like a jar you housed the infinite tenderness,
and the infinite oblivion shattered you like a jar.
There was the black solitude of the islands,
and there, woman of love, your arms took me in.
There was thirst and hunger, and you were the fruit.
There were grief and ruins, and you were the miracle.
Ah woman, I do not know how you could contain me
in the earth of your soul, in the cross of your arms!
Emerge tu recuerdo de la noche en que estoy.
El río anuda al mar su lamento obstinado.
Abandonado como los muelles en el alba.
Es la hora de partir, oh abandonado!
Sobre mi corazón llueven frías corolas.
Oh sentina de escombros, feroz cueva de náufragos.
En ti se acumularon las guerras y los vuelos.
De ti alzaron las alas los pájaros del canto.
Todo te lo tragaste, como la lejanía.
Como el mar, como el tiempo. Todo en ti fue naufragio!
Era la alegre hora del asalto y el beso.
La hora del estupor que ardía como un faro.
Ansiedad de piloto, furia de buzo ciego,
turbia embriaguez de amor, todo en ti fue naufragio!
En la infancia de niebla mi alma alada y herida.
Descubridor perdido, todo en ti fue naufragio!
Te ceñiste al dolor, te agarraste al deseo.
te tumbó la tristeza, todo en ti fue naufragio!
Hice retroceder la muralla de sombra,
anduve más allá del deseo y del acto.
Oh carne, carne mía, mujer que amé y perdí,
a ti en esta hora húmeda, evoco y hago canto.
Como un vaso albergaste la infinita ternura,
y el infinito olvido te trizó como a un vaso.
Era la negra, negra soledad de las islas,
y allí, mujer de amor, me acogieron tus brazos.
Era la sed y el hambre, y tú fuiste la fruta.
Era el duelo y las ruinas, y tú fuiste el milagro.
Ah mujer, no sé cómo pudiste contenerme
en la tierra de tu alma, y en la cruz de tus brazos!
This is one of Neruda's shorter poems. Its full of imagery of nature which, although simple, captivate you into the scene.
The poem creates a semblance of calamity in what was supposed to be a time of tranquility; ergo a storm in the summer. Perhaps this symbolizes troubling times in the lovers' lives.
The period of love and lust is gone and has been replaced by a more realistic display of lovers' spats. The kisses stop and the once invincible love is obviously shaken. The summer wind relentlessly tries to blow their love away.
This poem marks the beginning of the end for the lover Pablo Neruda and this woman share.
The morning is full of storm
in the heart of summer.
The clouds travel like white handkerchiefs of good-bye,
the wind, traveling, waving them in its hands.
The numberless heart of the wind
beating above our loving silence.
Orchestral and divine, resounding among the trees
like a language full of wars and songs.
Wind that bears off the dead leaves with a quick raid
and deflects the pulsing arrows of the birds.
Wind that topples her in a wave without spray
and substance without weight, and leaning fires.
Her mass of kisses breaks and sinks,
assailed in the door of the summer's wind.
Es la mañana llena de tempestad
en el corazón del verano.
Como pañuelos blancos de adiós viajan las nubes,
el viento las sacude con sus viajeras manos.
Innumerable corazón del viento
latiendo sobre nuestro silencio enamorado.
Zumbando entre los árboles, orquestal y divino,
como una lengua llena de guerras y de cantos.
Viento que lleva en rápido robo la hojarasca
y desvía las flechas latientes de los pájaros.
Viento que la derriba en ola sin espuma
y sustancia sin peso, y fuegos inclinados.
Se rompe y se sumerge su volumen de besos
combatido en la puerta de viento del verano.