Sunday, December 17, 2006

Two love sonnets from Pablo Neruda

I.
It's today: all of yesterday dropped away
among the fingers of the light and the sleeping eyes.
Tomorrow will come on its green footsteps;
no one can stop the river of the dawn.

No one can stop the river of your hands,
your eyes and their sleepiness, my dearest.
You are the trembling of time, which passes
between the vertical light and the darkening sky.

The sky folds its wings over you,
lifting you, carrying you to my arms
with its punctual, mysterious courtesy.

That's why I sing to the day and to the moon,
to the sea, to time, to all planets,
to your daily voice, to your nocturnal skin.

II.
You must know that I do not love and I love you,
because everything alive has its two sides;
a word is one wing of the silence,
fire has its cold half.

I love you in order to begin to love you,
to start infinity again
and never to stop loving you:
that's why I do not love you yet.

I love you, and I do not love you, as if I held
keys in my hand: to a future of joy-
a wretched, muddled fate-

My love has two lives, in order to love you:
that's why I love you when I do not love you,
and also why I love you when I do.

Translated by Stephen Tapscott.

1 comment:

LT said...

"I love you in order to begin to love you,
to start infinity again
and never to stop loving you:
that's why I do not love you yet."

very very nice! Thank you.