Fresh Quotes: Pablo Neruda

He was a poet, diplomat, bohemian and political activist. He was born Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto but borrowed his pen name from another poet; Jan Neruda. He was a controversial character. A diplomat and senator from Chile he embraced communism and wrote poetry in tribute to Stalin and Castro. You don’t have to agree with his politics to appreciate the sincerity in his work. The man was an artist; a heartfelt poet who won the Nobel Prize in literature.

Words are words no matter who wrote them and some messages are bigger than the messenger. As a writer there are times I feel I am only a conduit for something else. A something that whispers ever so softly in my ear. I only write what is given to me; words. And it’s the words of Neruda that I celebrate today. The dark dreamy words that evoke images of a hothouse world; a lush tropical jungle where love scintillates along the cool breeze of the night. He brought to his poetry a sense of quiet longing, of sadness and regret but with a spirit that burned… fiery passion and darkness; wanton and thirsty.

When I read his words I am transported to this world….I become a hothouse flower sipping in the cool night air, gazing up at the midnight stars that dare shine through the gaps between the leaves of the trees. Themes of bittersweet longing; of lust and love and all in between. Neruda puts his heart out there with brushstrokes of raw emotion tinged with the fragility of love that weaves itself between the lines of this beautiful poetry.

Fantastic writing.

😀

Have a nice day and enjoy the Neruda.

Nancy

FRESH QUOTES: PABLO NERUDA

The words of Pablo Neruda

“I should like to sleep like a cat,
with all the fur of time,
with a tongue rough as flint,
with the dry sex of fire;
and after speaking to no one,
stretch myself over the world,
over roofs and landscapes,
with a passionate desire
to hunt the rats in my dreams.”

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“And one by one the nights between our separated cities are joined to the night that unites us.”

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“And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.”

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“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 do not 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 your eyes close.”

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“At night I dream that you and I are two plants
that grew together, roots entwined,
and that you know the earth and the rain like my mouth,
since we are made of earth and rain.”

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“I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees.”

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“I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair.
Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets.
Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day
I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.”

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“So I wait for you like a lonely house
till you will see me again and live in me.
Till then my windows ache.”

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Pablo Neruda July 12, 1904 – September 23, 1973) was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after the Czech poet Jan Neruda. In 1971 Neruda won the Nobel Prize for Literature.