No, this one's nothing to do with my writings. It's about someone else, that wonderful poet Pablo Neruda, the one who wrote lines that make you delirious with pleasure, lines like -"You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep Spring from coming" and "I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, in secret, between the shadow and the soul".
He wrote crazily beautiful love poems, poems that make your heart swell and your eyes tear ( even in this staid middle age), and I haven't really found a better romantic poem writer in the modern times.
He was Chilean and wrote in Spanish. He was a politician, a diploma and a poet; a weird combination. He won the Nobel for literature in 1971, a year before I was born. He died in 1973, a year after I was born. Wait, there's more coincidence: We share our birthdays, today, the 12th of July!
In his honour and on the occasion of our shared birthdays, here's a piece of verse by him. It reflects something of the way in which I found poetry (or perhaps she found me) and the way it has influenced me.
Of course, it's called "Poetry":-
And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.
I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.
And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.
I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names,
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire,
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.
And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.
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