On a poet and obsessions

A few years ago I was in Chile for a meeting and had some free time to spend afterwards. Much of this was spent sampling the delights of Chilean vineyards, but it was suggested that Pablo Neruda's house would be worth a visit. I knew very little really about Neruda other than he was a famous poet and intellectual. I'd read a couple of his poems, that was about it. But after visiting his house in Santiago I felt an amazing kinship for the man, that he was a kindred spirit in many ways. Why?

(a) He was obsessed by books. My house is starting to look like a library. Well that's common enough but ...

(b) He designed his own houses, and not just in any old way - the house in Santiago was designed partially to look like a ship, with cool staircases and secret doors. It was like my dream house.

At the moment, my back deck looks a little ship like, with hammocks, and "poop deck" where the grill lives. I think Neruda would have approved.

I've dabbled in home design -  my kitchen was a tiny galley originally but I redesigned it, got a wall knocked through, and had a spiral staircase put in - it's now spacious, gracious and practical.

The tiny old galley kitchen

My kitchen after my re-design

I have plans drawn up for a house extension which are pretty flamboyant involving  a basement "pub", a library/gallery and a big new master bedroom with skylights and fireplace. I even have some money set aside to possibly build it one day. But Neruda took it to a whole another level.

Neruda not only had the Santiago house though, but another in Valparaiso built onto the side of a precipitous hill and a third (and possibly my favourite) – Isla Negra - next to the sea.

Neruda’s house in Santiago

The nautical-themed bar in Casa Isla Negra (taken through a window, so a little blurry)

The view from Neruda’s deck, Isla Negra

(c) He was an obsessive collector - ships in bottles, maritime instruments, sea shells, masks, even entire ship's figure heads. With his Nobel prize winnings he bought a narwhal tusk (something that I’ve just discovered, and a little eerie as I have one in my study at the moment – I got it after I received a big promotion), just because he thought it was cool.

I'm a little OCD. Well, maybe more than a little. I currently have substantial collections of shot glasses, whisky miniatures, fridge magnets, tree frogs, stuffed animal toys/puppets, pirate knick-knacks and I'm developing collections of interesting beer labels, dice, octopuses, wooden boxes, swords, wine corks and pint glasses with interesting designs, and various others. But again Neruda took it to a whole new level, with rooms and even wings of his house filled with his collections.

(d) He stood up for what he believed in, even if you don’t agree with his politics, you have to respect that. He dabbled in politics throughout his life, but most importantly he stood up against what he saw as injustice, oppression and mistreatment.

When Pinochet’s coup took over the Chilean government, Neruda was terminally ill with prostate cancer.  Soon after the overthrow, government soldiers raided Neruda's house. To the invaders he famously said: "Look around—there's only one thing of danger for you here—poetry."  They destroyed much of his property and burnt many of his books.  burnt his books. To lose so much, and to see a regime which would gleefully destroy knowledge and creativity, well it was said by his friends that it broke his heart. He died twelve days later.

Finally, I couldn’t possibly write about Neruda without including some of his poetry (bear in mind that it lost something in translation), so here you are:

Saddest Poem

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.

Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."

The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?

I can write the saddest poem of all 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 poem falls to the soul as dew to 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. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.

As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.

The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.

I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.

Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.

Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.

Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her

Neruda wrote a lot of poems about strange things, a tuna in the market, his socks, tomatoes, a penguin. Here’s part of his poem about wine.

Ode to wine

Day-colored wine,
night-colored wine,
wine with purple feet
or wine with topaz blood,
wine,
starry child
of earth,
wine, smooth
as a golden sword,
soft
as lascivious velvet,
wine, spiral-seashelled
and full of wonder,
amorous,
marine;
never has one goblet contained you,
one song, one man,
you are choral, gregarious,
at the least, you must be shared.
At times
you feed on mortal
memories;
your wave carries us
from tomb to tomb,
stonecutter of icy sepulchers,
and we weep
transitory tears;
your
glorious
spring dress
is different,
blood rises through the shoots,
wind incites the day,
nothing is left
of your immutable soul.
Wine
stirs the spring, happiness
bursts through the earth like a plant,
walls crumble,
and rocky cliffs,
chasms close,
as song is born.
A jug of wine, and thou beside me
in the wilderness,
sang the ancient poet.
Let the wine pitcher
add to the kiss of love its own.