Neruda And Vallejo: Selected Poems Part 37

Nevertheless I resisted the sharp temptation to save them somewhere as schoolboys keep fireflies, as learned men collect sacred texts, I resisted the mad impulse to put them into a golden cage and each day give them birdseed and pieces of pink melon.

Like explorers in the jungle who hand over the very rare green deer to the spit and eat it with remorse, I stretched out my feet and pulled on the magnificent socks and then my shoes.

The moral of my ode is this: beauty is twice beauty and what is good is doubly good when it is a matter of two socks made of wool in winter.

Translated by Robert Bly

ODA A LA SANDIA.

El rbol del verano intenso, invulnerable, es todo cielo azul, sol amarillo, cansancio a goterones, es una espada sobre los caminos, un zapato quemado en las ciudades: la claridad, el mundo nos agobian, nos pegan en los ojos con polvareda, con sbitos golpes de oro, nos acosan los pies con espinitas, con piedras calurosas, y la boca sufre ms que todos los dedos: tienen sed la garganta, la dentadura, los labios y la lengua: queremos beber las cataratas, la noche azul, el polo, y entonces cruza el cielo el ms fresco de todos los planetas, la redonda, suprema y celestial sanda.

Es la fruta del rbol de la sed.

Es la ballena verde del verano.

El universo seco de p.r.o.nto tachonado por este firmamento de frescura deja caer la fruta rebosante: se abren sus hemisferios mostrando una bandera verde, blanca, escarlata, que se disuelve en cascada, en azcar, en delicia!

Cofre del agua, plcida reina de la frutera, bodega de la profundidad, luna terrestre!

Oh pura, en tu abundancia se deshacen rubes y uno quisiera morderte hundiendo en ti la cara, el pelo, el alma!

Te divisamos en la sed como mina o montana de esplendido alimento, pero te conviertes entre la dentadura y el deseo en slo fresca luz que se desle en manantial que nos toc cantando.

Y as no pesas en la siesta abrasadora, no pesas, slo pasas y tu gran corazn de brasa fra se convirti en el agua de una gota.

ODE TO THE WATERMELON.

The tree of intense summer, hard, is all blue sky, yellow sun, fatigue in drops, a sword above the highways, a scorched shoe in the cities: the brightness and the world weigh us down, hit us in the eyes with clouds of dust, with sudden golden blows, they torture our feet with tiny thorns, with hot stones, and the mouth suffers more than all the toes: the throat becomes thirsty, the teeth, the lips, the tongue: we want to drink waterfalls, the dark blue night, the South Pole, and then the coolest of all the planets crosses the sky, the round, magnificent, star-filled watermelon.

It's a fruit from the thirst-tree.

It's the green whale of the summer.

The dry universe all at once given dark stars by this firmament of coolness lets the swelling fruit come down: its hemispheres open showing a flag green, white, red, that dissolves into wild rivers, sugar, delight!

Jewel box of water, phlegmatic queen of the fruitshops, warehouse of profundity, moon on earth!

You are pure, rubies fall apart in your abundance, and we want to bite into you, to bury our face in you, and our hair, and the soul!

When we're thirsty we glimpse you like a mine or a mountain of fantastic food, but among our longings and our teeth you change simply into cool light that slips in turn into spring water that touched us once singing.

And that is why you don't weigh us down in the siesta hour that's like an oven, you don't weigh us down, you just go by and your heart, some cold ember, turned itself into a single drop of water.

Translated by Robert Bly

ODA A LA SAL.

Esta sal del salero yo la v en los salares.

Se que no van a creerme, pero canta, canta la sal, la piel de los salares, canta con una boca ahogada por la tierra.

Me estremec en aquellas soledades cuando escuche la voz de la sal en el desierto.

Cerca de Antof.a.gasta toda la pampa salitrosa suena: es una voz quebrada, un lastimero canto.

Luego en sus cavidades la sal gema, montana de una luz enterrada, catedral transparente, cristal del mar, olvido de las olas.

Y luego en cada mesa de este mundo, sal, tu substancia gil espolvoreando la luz vital sobre los alimentos.

Preservadora de las antiguas bodegas del navo, descubridora fuiste en el oceano, materia adelantada en los desconocidos, entreabiertos senderos de la espuma.

Polvo del mar, la lengua de ti recibe un beso de la noche marina: el gusto funde en cada sazonado manjar tu oceana y as la mnima, la minscula ola del salero nos ensena no slo su domestica blancura, sino el sabor central del infinito.

ODE TO SALT.

I saw the salt in this shaker in the salt flats.

I know you will never believe me, but it sings, the salt sings, the hide of the salt plains, it sings through a mouth smothered by earth.

I shuddered in those deep solitudes when I heard the voice of the salt in the desert.

Near Antof.a.gasta the entire salt plain speaks: it is a broken voice, a song full of grief.

Then in its own mines rock salt, a mountain of buried light, a cathedral through which light pa.s.ses, crystal of the sea, abandoned by the waves.

And then on every table on this earth, salt, your nimble body pouring out the vigorous light over our foods.

Preserver of the stores of the ancient ships, you were an explorer in the ocean, substance going first over the unknown, barely open routes of the sea-foam.

Dust of the sea, the tongue receives a kiss of the night sea from you: taste recognizes the ocean in each salted morsel, and therefore the smallest, the tiniest wave of the shaker brings home to us not only your domestic whiteness but the inward flavor of the infinite.

Translated by Robert Bly

THE LAMB AND THE PINECONE.

(An interview with Pablo Neruda by Robert Bly) A great river of images has flowed into your poetry, as well as into the poetry of Lorca, Aleixandre, Vallejo, and Hernndez-an outpouring of poetry from the very roots of poetry. Why has the greatest poetry in the twentieth century appeared in the Spanish language?

I must tell you it is very nice to hear such a thing from an American poet. Of course we believe in enthusiasm too, but still we are all modest workers-we must not make too many comparisons. I must tell you two different things about poetry in Spanish. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Spanish poetry was great-you had such giants as Gngora, Quevedo, Lope de Vega, and many, many others. Then, for three centuries after that, no poetry-a very, very small poetry. Finally, the generation of Lorca, Alberti, and Aleixandre wrote a large poetry again-they rose up against this small poetry. How, and why? We should remember that this generation of poets is coincident with the political awakening of Spain as a republic, the awakening of a great country that was asleep. Suddenly they had all the energy and strength of a man waking. I told about that in my poem, "How Spain Was," which I am sure you remember from our reading at the Poetry Center last night. Unfortunately, you see what happened. The Franco revolt. It sent into exile and to death so many of the poets. That happened with Miguel Hernndez, Lorca, and Antonio Machado, who was really a cla.s.sic of the century.

Poetry in South America is a different matter altogether. You see there are in our countries rivers which have no names, trees which n.o.body knows, and birds which n.o.body has described. It is easier for us to be surrealistic because everything we know is new. Our duty, then, as we understand it, is to express what is unheard of. Everything has been painted in Europe, everything has been sung in Europe. But not in America. In that sense, Whitman was a great teacher. Because what is Whitman? He was not only intensely conscious, but he was open-eyed! He had tremendous eyes to see everything-he taught us to see things. He was our poet.

Whitman has clearly had much more influence on the Spanish poets than on the North American poets. Why didn't the North American poets understand him? Was it because of the influence of England?

Perhaps, perhaps the intellectualist influence of England. Also many of the American poets just following Eliot thought that Whitman was too rustic, too primitive. But he is not so simple-Whitman-he's a complicated man and the best of him is when he is most complicated. He had eyes open to the world and he taught us about poetry and many other things. We have loved him very much. Eliot never had much influence with us. He's too intellectual perhaps, we are too primitive. And then everyone has to choose a road-a refined and intellectual way, or a more brotherly, general way, trying to embrace the world around you, to discover the new world.

In his essays, Eliot directed attention toward tradition. But the suggestion you made seems to be that really South America has no tradition-America has no tradition-and admitting this lack of tradition has opened up things.

That is an interesting thing. We do have to mention that in some South American poets you can see the trace of very old ways of thought and expression, Indian ways of thought in Vallejo, for instance. Cesar Vallejo has something that comes from very deep in his country, Peru, which is an Indian country. He is a wonderful poet, as you know.

As for a literary tradition, what tradition could we have? The Spanish poetry of the 19th century was a very poor poetry-rhetorical and false-postromantic in the worst way. They never did have a good romantic poet. They had no Sh.e.l.ley, no Goethe. Nothing of the sort. No, no. Rhetorical and empty.

Your poetry presents a vision of affection between people, an affection between man and animals, compa.s.sion for plants and snakes, and a certain give and take between man and his unconscious. Most modern poets present a very different vision. How do you feel about that?

Well, I make a distinction between kinds of poetry. I am not a theoretician, but I do see as one kind of poetry the poetry which is written in closed rooms. I'll give as an example Mallarme, a very great French poet. I have sometimes seen photographs of his room; they were full of little beautiful objects-"abanicos"-fans. He used to write beautiful poems on fans. But his rooms were stuffy, all full of curtains, no air. He is a great poet of closed rooms and it seems that many of the New World poets follow this tradition: they don't open the windows and you not only have to open the window but come through the windows and live with rivers and animals and beasts. I would say to young poets of my country and of Latin America-perhaps this is our tradition-to discover things, to be in the sea, to be in the mountains, and approach every living thing. And how can you not love such an approach to life, that has such extravagant surprises?

I live by a very rough sea in Isla Negra-my house is there-and I am never tired of being alone looking at the sea and working there. It is a perpetual discovery for me. I don't know, maybe I am a foolish 19th century nature lover like your great writer Th.o.r.eau, and other contemplative writers. I am not contemplative, but I think that is a great part of a poet's life.

You have fought many political battles, fighting seriously and steadily like a bear, and yet you have not ended up obsessed with political matters like Tolstoy, or embittered. Your poetry seems to become more and more human, and affectionate. Now how do you explain that?

You see, I come from a country which is very political. Those who fight have great support from the ma.s.ses. Practically all the writers of Chile are out to the left-there are almost no exceptions. We feel supported and understood by our own people. That gives us great security and the numbers of people who support us are very great. You see the elections in Chile are won by one side or the other by few votes only. As poets we are really in touch with the people, which is very rare. I read my poems everywhere in my country-every village, every town-for years and years, and I feel it is my duty to do it. It is a tiresome thing, but partly from that has come my attachment to politics. I have seen so much the misery of my country. The poverty I see-I cannot get away from that.

Only in recent years have the people in the United States begun to realize what South American literature is. They still know very little about it.

I think the problem here is a matter of translation. We need to have more North American writers translated into Spanish and South American poetry and literature translated into English. The delegation of the P.E.N. Club of Chile have shown me a list of books they have drawn up. The list contains one hundred basic works in South American literature which could be read by all the North American people. They intend to look for support for this project and plan to present it as a motion during the P.E.N. Congress. That is a good idea. I don't know if the P.E.N. Club can support it, but someone should support the project. The whole problem of translation is a great and serious one. Imagine-that Vallejo's work has never been published in the United States! Only the twenty poems published by your Sixties Press.

I know you have come to believe that among the many enemies mankind has are G.o.ds. I think you said you first felt this in Rangoon. But don't the G.o.ds come from the unconscious of men, just as poems do? In what sense then are they enemies?

In the beginning G.o.ds help like poems. Man makes G.o.ds who help men. But afterward men overpower G.o.ds and then bankruptcy.

I have a good question for you. Do you think you have ever lived before?

I don't know I don't think-I will try to inquire!

Tolstoy said a new consciousness was developing in humanity, like a new organ, and that the governments had set themselves to stop the growth of this new consciousness. Do you think this is true?

In general, you see, governments have never understood anywhere in the world the spirit of writers and poets. That is the general thing which we are going to cure. How? Producing and writing. You poets are doing a wonderful thing in the United States which I have seen from your lectures in public and all that. You are awakening a new thing since you are defending this spirit you are talking about.

Cesar Vallejo, after struggling through or plunging into a long period of surrealism (The Trilce Poems), came out into a very human simplicity in Poemas Humanos. You also pa.s.sed through a long period of surrealist poetry in Residencia en la Tierra and then came out into the simplicity of Odas Elementales. Isn't it strange you have both followed the same path?

I love Vallejo. I always admired him, we were brothers. Nevertheless, we were very different. Race especially. He was Peruvian. He was a very Peruvian man and to me Peruvian man is something interesting. We came from different worlds. I have never thought about what you tell me. I like very much the way you approach us-that you bring us near each other in our work worlds. I never thought of it. I like it.

What was Vallejo like when you were in a room with him? Was he excitable, or calm and broody?

Vallejo was usually very serious, very solemn, you see, with great dignity. He had a very high forehead and he was small in stature, and he kept himself very much aloof. But among friends-I don't know if he was this way with others but he was with us-I have seen him jumping with happiness, jumping. So I knew at least these two sides of him.

People often talk of the "Indian element" which they see in much Latin American poetry and fiction. What is this "Indian element" exactly?

In Vallejo it shows itself as a subtle way of thought, a way of expression that is not direct, but oblique. I don't have it. I am a Castilian poet. In Chile we defend the Indians and almost all South Americans have some Indian blood, I do too. But I don't think my work is in any way Indian.

In Residencia your poems dug deeper and deeper into despair, like a man digging into black earth. Then you turned away in another direction, and your poetry moved more and more toward a simplicity. Did this come about partly because the Spanish Civil War made it absolutely clear how much the people needed help?

You say that very well-it is true. You see, when I wrote Residencia One and Two I was living in India. I was twenty-one, twenty-two, and twenty-three years old. I was isolated from the Indian people, whom I didn't know, and also from the English people whom I didn't understand, nor did they understand me, and I was in a very lonely situation. I was in an exciting country which I couldn't penetrate, which I couldn't understand well. They were lonely days and years for me. In 1934 I was transferred as consul to Madrid. The Civil War did help me and inspire me to live more near the people, to understand more and to be more natural. For the first time I felt that I belonged to a community.

Have your opinions of Rilke and the "Poetas Celestes" (Divine Poets) changed at all since the poem you wrote attacking them?

Yes, I must say I have been mistaken many times in my life. I was dogmatic and foolish. But the trend of my ideas is as it was. Only in my exaggeration I was mistaken, because he is a great poet, just as Kafka is a great writer. Excuse me, but the contradictions-one sees them only when life rolls on, one sees one has been mistaken.

Many people feel that the quality of literary work being done now shows a decline from the work being done thirty years ago? Do you think so?

No, no. I think the creativity is strong. I see so many new forms in poetry now in the young poets I have never seen before. There is no more fear of experience. Before there was a great fear of breaking the mold and now there is no more of this fear. It is wonderful.

How come you don't have that fear of experience?

It took me a lot of time to have no fear. When I was a young poet I was full of fear like a real rat in a corner. When I was a very young poet I was afraid to break all the laws which were enforced on us by the critics. But now there is no more of this. All the young poets come in and say what they like and do what they like.

In one of your essays you described something that happened to you as a boy which you thought has had a great influence on your poetry. There was a fence in your backyard. Through a hole in it one day a small hand pa.s.sed through to you a gift-a toy lamb. And you went into the house and came back and handed back through the hole the thing you loved most-a pinecone.

Yes, that boy pa.s.sed me a lamb, a woolen lamb. It was beautiful.