12 lovely poems in both Spanish and English.

I had too many expectations of this short collection of poems of the sea. I like that the original poems in Spanish are provided in English translation, and I enjoyed seeing the nuances. Otherwise I finished wanting more, not because it was too little of something so good that I wanted more, but instead that it was just too little of what I had hoped it would be to be fulfilling. Also, I'm not typically a reader of books of poetry, so perhaps it's my bias.

I wish I knew enough to read him in the original.

However, the English translations were beautiful.

Great collection of Neruda sea poems. He loved his Isla Negra. Fabulous verses and the untranslated verses also read melodious. I read through the volume in one sitting ... took me half an hour or so. The paintings, in the book, are excellent and the afterword. Great poems about the sea, with enticing images ... thought-provoking, pretty. I recommend this book to all poetry-lovers.

ok, so this is the story. I saw this book at Barnes and Noble and it was a little pricey. But everytime we went there I would grab it and sit on a couch and read the poems. Shane finally got it for me and Oh my goodness. That is me! Ocean ,sand, poems, Chile, Neruda. I read it and even if it is a dark cold winter snowy night in Utah I can transport myself to Isla Negra and feel the warmth of the sun , the smell of the ocean, hear the waves. I am there in my dreams. If I feel blue...that is what I do, take that book go to a quiet place and read it.

Beautifully designed. Translations are easy to understand. Nice illustrations but not necessarily enhancing the accompanied poetry. All illustrations I find beautiful work of art though not necessarily part of the poetry. A good read. I enjoyed.

such, concise, powerful verses

This book brings together two of my favorite things -- the ocean and the poems of Pablo Neruda. Neruda, a Nobel Prize-winning poet from Chile, in the second half of his life spent as much time as possible at his seaside house, Isla Negra. There he wrote poems about the sea, but not always in a romantic way; he wrote about the violence of the sea and shipwrecks and dead animals on the beach, too.

One of my favorites collected here is "Poet's Obligation." If you're stuck inside somewhere "this Friday morning," Neruda will remind you of the existence of the ocean:

So, drawn on by my destiny,
I ceaselessly must listen to and keep
the sea's lamenting in my consciousness,
I must feel the crash of the hard water
and gather it up in a perpetual cup
so that, wherever those in prison may be,
wherever they suffer the sentence of the autumn,
I may be present with an errant wave,
I may move in and out of windows,
and hearing me, eyes may lift themselves,
asking "How can I reach the sea?"
And I will pass to them, saying nothing,
the starry echoes of the wave,
a breaking up of foam and quicksand,
a rustling of salt withdrawing itself,
the gray cry of sea birds on the coast.

So, through me, freedom and the sea
will call in answer to the shrouded heart.

Poet and political writer Pablo Neruda assembled a collection of twelve poems that convey his connections to the Pacific Coast region in central Chile that was his home for many years.

After a tumultuous career as a diplomat and ambassador, Neruda retired to an oceanfront cottage with his wife, Mathilde Urrutia. He collected ship figureheads, nautical instruments, and fishing nets. He took walks on the beach and meditated to the sound of the waves. Out of this introspection came half of his published poetry collections, composed from his rooms overlooking the ocean.

In “Here, There, Everywhere,” Neruda describes the advantages of this chosen solitude, his feeling of responsibility for the people he represented, and the issues he spoke so passionately about:

"Now I have all I have loved within my little universe, the starred order of waves, the sudden disorder of stones. Far off, a city in rags calling me, poor siren, so that my heart can never, no, scorn its weight of obligation, and I with sky and poems on the light of all I love, poised here, swithering, raising the cup of my song."

Neruda enjoyed a quarter century of quiet reflection and productive work before his death after a political coup in Chile in 1973.

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This is my first experience with Neruda's poetry and I found it to be mesmerizing. Each poem in this collection is a love letter to the sea. Neruda's imagery is beautiful, but even more, his words are emotionally charged with his deep attachment to the solitude of water and sand. I lived for a time just blocks from a Hawaiian beach, a place that still lives within me, and so Neruda's words brought me back to that "blue shore of silence." Lovely.

A beautiful, elegantly designed book. Great as a gift, though these are not the strongest of Neruda's poems.