Pablo Neruda Quotes - Page 8

Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the stars of the south? Oh let me remember you as you were before you existed.

From sorrow to sorrow love crosses its islands and establishes roots that are watered by weeping.

And I watch my words from a long way off. They are more yours than mine. They climb on my old suffering like ivy.

Hate is like a swordfish, working through water invisibly and then you see it coming with blood along its blade, but transparency disarms it.

Ah, love is a voyage with water and a star, in drowning air and squalls of precipitate bran; love is a war of lights in the lightning flashes, two bodies blasted in a single burst of honey.

The tomato offers its gift of fiery color and cool completeness.

Where were you then? Who else was there? Saying what? Why will the whole of love come on me suddenly when I am sad and feel you are far away?

A book, a book full of human touches, of shirts, a book without loneliness, with men and tools, a book is victory.

I walked around as you do, investigating the endless star, and in my net, during the night, I woke up naked, the only thing caught, a fish trapped inside the wind.

The night is shattered, and the blue stars shiver in the distance.

And I, a materialist who does not believe in the starry heaven promised to a human being, for this dog and for every dog I believe in heaven, yes, I believe in a heaven that I will never enter, but he waits for me wagging his big fan of a tail so I, soon to arrive, will feel welcomed.

On our earth, before writing was invented, before the printing press was invented, poetry flourished. That is why we know that poetry is like bread; it should be shared by all, by scholars and by peasants, by all our vast, incredible, extraordinary family of humanity.

my feet will want to walk to where you are sleeping but I shall go on living.

What does autumn go on paying for with so much yellow money?

Writing poetry, we live among the wild beasts, and when we touch a man, the stuff of someone in whom we believed, and he goes to pieces like a rotten pie, you... gather together whatever can be salvaged, while I cup my hands around the live coal of life.

Love, what a long way, to arrive at a kiss.

And I watch my words from a long way off. They are more yours than mine. They climb on my old suffering like ivy. It climbs the same way on damp walls. You are to blame for this cruel sport. They are fleeing from my dark lair. You fill everything, you fill everything. Before you they peopled the solitude that you occupy, and they are more used to my sadness than you are. Now I want them to say what I want to say to you to make you hear as I want you to hear me.

Political poetry is more profoundly emotional than any other-at least as much as love poetry-and cannot be forced because then it becomes vulgar and unacceptable. It is necessary first to pan though all other poetry in order to become a political poet.

The best poet is the man who delivers our daily bread: the local baker.

My duty moves along with my song: I am I am not: that is my destiny. I exist not if I do not attend to the pain of those who suffer: they are my pains. For I cannot be without existing for all, for all who are silent and oppressed, I come from the people and I sing for them: my poetry is song and punnishment.

Who do I belong to? How come I mortgaged my being till I don't belong to myself? How come I sold my blood? And who now owns my indecisions, my hands, my private pain, my pride?

How much does a man live, after all?/ Does he live a thousand days, or one only? For a week, or for several centuries?/ How long does a man spend dying?/ What does it mean to say 'for ever'?

Cómo se acuerda con los pájaros la traducción de sus idiomas?

And our problems will crumble apart, the soul / blow through like a wind, and here where we live will all be clean again, with fresh bread on the table.

In this part of the story I am the one who dies, the only one, and I will die of love because I love you, because I love you, Love, in fire and in blood.