Sonnet Sunday: Neruda

Sonnet 16, translated by Terence Clarke

I love the clump of earth that you are,
because, from the planetary prairies,
I have no other star. You repeat
the universal multiplications.

Your wide eyes are the light that's left
of the defeated constellations.
Your skin quivers like the trails left
in the rain by the passing meteor.

Of so much of the moon, for me, were your hips,
of the entire sun your deep mouth and its delicacy,
of so much burning light, like shadowed honey,

your heart, charred with long red rays.
And so I pass by your fiery form, kissing you,
planetary and small, my geography, my dove.

Sonnet Sunday: Neruda

Sorry it's late: busy day.
Sonnet XVII by Pablo Neruda

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.