Pablo Neruda, I picked up this because my boyfriend took him as an inspiration :) I respect and like my boyfriend's work a lot, and so I dove right in. However, because people try to copy him all the time, my view was tainted. I could not fully appreciate his work because of all the people who are trying to copy him, oh god, it hurt me. It hurt me because the familiarity of each stanza, the way people scrape up this man's work, it just warped it all. Can you get me? Like you trying to read some beautiful work and like you just remember how others butchered this style. I decided I'll read it again when I get older. I think my favourite though is "I Would Like You to Be Still" which is the first poem I read from him with much interest from a website dedicated to him.

Love Neruda's adoration of the sea and women. You can hear the stillness and the grand sadness of waves in every poem. Here is a bit from his poem 20:

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write for example, 'The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Surrealist, sexual, fun. I know I'll reread this a few times. Not only is he possibly a new favourite poet, his use of language (and the original text being here too) means it'll really help my Spanish. I also feel like I don't "know him" as well as I want to.

What else can I say? This was just a good book. Being completely honest wasn't always there with it, I am sure I will be in the future!

I loved reading these poems. I wish I knew Spanish better so I could read them as he originally wrote them.

n   'Every day you play with the light of the universe.
Subtle visitor, you arrive in the flower and the water.
You are more than this white head that I hold tightly
as a cluster of fruit, every day, between my hands' - n
from Every Day You Play

500 pages of the most beautifully written poetry. Right from the early days of his sexy, dark, whimsical, complex poetry to the more relaxed reflection style in later years. A wonderful mix of romantic poetry, life ponderings and travel. I really love that he often draws on his experience of living by the sea and by a pine forest, making for very dreamy prose inspired by mother nature. It helped get me through a very emotionally bumpy 6 months. Also good to have the original Spanish versions alongside the English because I could test myself on my Spanish vocabulary knowledge!

Extract from The Marine Night (its 3 pages of beautifulness)

Marine night, white and green statue,
I love you: sleep with me. I went through all
the streets, disintegrating and dying,
the wood grew with me, man
vanquished his ashes and got ready
to rest surrounded by the earth.

Night fell so that your eyes
might not see his wretched repose:
desiring to be close, he opened his arms
guarded by beings and walls,
and fell into the dream of silence, descending
with his roots into funeral land.
I, Oceanic night, arrived with the love that makes me,
and reached your open form, the vastness that Aldebaran
watches over, the wet mouth of your song.

I saw you, night of the sea, as you were born,
bruised by infinite mother-of-pearl:
I watched the starry threads weaving
and the electricity of your girdle
and the blue motion of the sounds
that harass your devoured sweetness.

This is a wide selection of Neruda's poetry from the 1920's to the 1960's. His early poems aren't my favourite, yeah there are some great ones but I find them messy, wordy and the juxtaposition of words and images not to be all that great. But his later stuff is far more consistent and gets the point over more clearly. Highlights ~ "Body of a woman" "Every Day You Play" "Tonight I can write the saddest lines" "Dream Horses" "Weak With the Dawn" "Some Beasts" "Gold" "Rain" "Ode to the Storm" "Too Many Names" "The Lion" and "The Watersong Ends".

If someone wrote about me the way Neruda writes, I would be head over heels instantly:

"My words rained over you, stroking you.
A long time I have loved
the sunned mother-of-pearl of your body.
Until I even believe that you own the universe.
I will bring you happy flowers from the mountains,
bluebells, dark hazels, and rustic baskets of kisses.
I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees."

The way he writes is simply outstanding

"Water water water,
the past goes on falling
still a tangle
of bones
and of roots
it has been, it has been, and now
memories mean nothing."

Definitely will be re-reading.

Although there are a handful of Neruda's poems that I absolutely adore, I spent a majority of this collection kind of lost.

The greatest Poet

So beautiful, Neruda never fails to bring me to tears and awe. His actions and moral failures sadden me, it's hard to think that someone who can write something like this can also be so so horrible.

I really wanted to fall in love with Neruda, but I found that he wasn’t for me. I often lost interest in the middle of his long pieces & many of the ones in this collection fit that bill.

Neruda’s early work was probably my favorite out of everything I read here. He was certainly a skilled writer, just not one that really resonates with me.

I'll come back for a proper review.