Neruda must have known some moody ladies! Here's another moving love poem, this time about a lover who keeps the speaker at a distance, which seems to him as wide and deep as the sea.

‘Leaning into the afternoon’

VII From:’ Veinte poemas de amor’

Leaning into the afternoon, I cast my saddened nets,

towards your oceanic eyes.

There, in the highest fire, my solitude unrolls and ignites,

arms flailing like a drowning man’s.

I send out crimson flares across your distant eyes,

that swell like the waves, at the base of a lighthouse.

You only guard darkness, far-off woman of mine,

from your gaze the shore of trepidation sometimes emerges.

Leaning towards afternoon, I fling my saddened nets,

into the sea, your eyes of ocean trouble.

The night-birds peck at the early stars,

that glitter as my soul does, while it loves you.

The night gallops, on its mare of shadows,

spilling blue silken tassels of corn, over the fields.

- Pablo Neruda

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