Pablo Neruda
(1904-1973)
Before the word, there was Pablo Neruda alchemizing languages and experience by the wine dark seas off Santiago, Chile. Walt Whitman's hermano for the twentieth century. One of a tradition of Latino Bards that includes Vallejo, Lorca, Dario and Paz: a kind of precious metal that runs through the veins of America, which no conquistador could melt down.
In Neruda is a poetry that invokes the extraordinary in the ordinary: poetry as impure as the clothing we wear, a poetry that invokes the mandates of touch, smell, taste, sight, hearing, the passion for justice, sexual desire.
To read Neruda is to indulge in a banquet of the senses; a meal of such spice and exquisite textures that even the gods descend for one final banquet. Start with Odas Elementales (Elemental Odes), Cien Sonetos de Amor (One Hundred Love Sonnets), and The Heights of Machu Pichu
(translated by Ben Belit). After that, there is more than half a century of work (1925-70) to choose from.