I came across a book of Pablo Neruda's poetry the other day, called The Essential Pablo Neruda, and wondered onto a particular selection that reminded me of a song from Sixpence None the Richer's 1998 release. The specific song is called Puedo Escribir and the lead singer, Leigh Nash, sings some of the verses from the following Neruda poem in Spanish. As you can see, I only put the English verse here for everyone's poetic perusal.
I can write the saddest verses
I can write the saddest verses tonight.
Write, for example, "The night is full of stars,
twinkling blue in the distance."
The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.
I can write the saddest verses tonight.
I wanted her, and sometimes she wanted me too.
On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.
She wanted me, at times I wanted her too.
How not to have loved her great, still eyes.
I can write the saddest verses tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.
To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the verse falls onto my soul as dew onto grass.
What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.
That's all. In the distance, someone sings. In the distance.
My soul is not content with having lost her.
As if to bring her closer, my gaze searches for her,
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.
The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, of the then, now are no longer the same.
I no longer want her, true, but how much I wanted her.
My voice searched for the wind that would touch her ear.
Another's. She will be another's. As before my kisses.
Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes.
I no longer want her, true, but perhaps I want her.
Love is so short and forgetting is so long.
Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is not content with having lost her.
Though this may be the last pain she causes me,
these are the last verses I write for her.
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