Ex-lovers, old memories

An email from a friend today has awakened a distant memory, stirred an unexplainable longing, teased thoughts about love and romance. It made me wonder about the wonderful things and experiences I’ve had that I didn’t fully appreciate. My carefree personality sometimes predisposes me to superficial grasps to life experiences.

Many moons ago, I quietly slipped out of someone’s life. I didn’t think I had made such an impact in his life that it would matter too much if I just left. A few months later, I received a hand-written letter with a poem by Neruda. I thought then how sweet it was and thought I understood how he felt about me. Maybe not.

Today, I received a link from a friend. Andy Garcia reads the poem and it was so hauntingly beautiful. It’s a foggy day out and it’s so quiet here. The perfect conditions for nostalgia. So, here I am – listening to Andy read and having random thoughts of ex-lovers and old memories.

Reading this poem again gives me an appreciation of the love I’ve received from so many people and it is a reminder of how fragile hearts can be and hope I never break anyone else’s.

Tonight I Can Write - Andy Garcia

Puedo Iscribir by Neruda

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.

Write, for example,’The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance.’

The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

Through nights like this one I held her in my arms
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.

She loved me and sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes.

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered and she is not with me.

This is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.

The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.

I no longer love her, that’s certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.

Another’s. She will be another’s. Like my kisses before.
Her voice. Her bright body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that’s certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.

Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.

Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer
and these the last verses that I write for her.

Comments

[Manoj Agarwal]

Ruthie,
This is truly touching
Read and heard that many times
Thank you