Every Day You Play

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.

You are like nobody since I love you.
Let me spread you out among yellow garlands.
Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the stars of the south?
Oh let me remember you as you were before you existed.

Suddenly the wind howls and bangs at my shut window.
The sky is a net crammed with shadowy fish.
Here all the winds let go sooner or later, all of them.
The rain takes off her clothes.

The birds go by, fleeing.
The wind. The wind.
I can contend only against the power of men.
The storm whirls dark leaves
and turns loose all the boats that were moored last night to the sky.

You are here. Oh, you do not run away.
You will answer me to the last cry.
Cling to me as though you were frightened.
Even so, at one time a strange shadow ran through your eyes.

Now, now too, little one, you bring me honeysuckle,
and even your breasts smell of it.
While the sad wind goes slaughtering butterflies
I love you, and my happiness bites the plum of your mouth.

How you must have suffered getting accustomed to me,
my savage, solitary soul, my name that sends them all running.
So many times we have seen the morning star burn, kissing our eyes,
and over our heads the gray light unwind in turning fans.

My words rained over you, stroking you.
A long time I have loved the sunned mother-of-pearl of your body.
I go so far as to think 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.

Pablo Neruda

It’s no secret that I love Pablo Neruda’s poetry. The official start of spring is still over a month away and it certainly doesn’t feel very spring-like around here. However, my mind has been on spring.  I’m trying to think warm.  So far, it hasn’t worked, but I’ll keep trying.  🙂

That last line of the poem gets me every time.  I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees. I have always read that line as the most extraordinary metaphor for sensuality, awakening, and the magic of transformation. It is always very dark and gray outside in the months preceding the cherry blossoms. When they finally arrive — as they do, unfailingly each year — I feel reborn, fresh, invigorated. The world is once again full of hope, magic, and promise again after a long, cold, damp, dark season.