The House that Neruda Built

I remember you as you were in the last autumn. 

You were the grey beret and the still heart.

In your eyes the flames of the twilight fought on.

And the leaves fell in the water of your soul.

-Pablo Neurda

I saw the hand-written verse of the poem "I Remember You as You Were" at Pablo Neruda's house here in Santiago. [sigh] What a Love Poet he was.

Neruda is Chile's Mr. Poet. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971. Wait, that sounds too dry. Let me try it more poetically: From his soul a river of fanciful words did run / For this the highest honor he won

Neruda built a house at the bottom on Saint Cristobal Hill for himself and his lover-turned-wife. The inside of the house resembles a ship's hold, everything is thick, dark wood and low ceilings. There are wooden carvings from the south Pacific, modernist paintings, and a trio of big--I think freaky--dolls in one of the bathrooms. He purposely had small tables so that people would draw near one another and have good conversations.

I visited the house turned museum with my friend Magda. It was a lovely spring day, the type that gets you thinking, softly about summer. We both showed up in summer dresses and sunglasses.

After, I said, "It's the perfect day for sangria." and she finished with "Do you want to go to 100 Montaditos?" To which I replied gleefully, truly, "Yes!"

We drank sangria on the second floor terrace, people watching from above. We smiled conspiratorially as we both admitted to sometimes pausing and saying, "I can't believe I live in Chile."

As we left, I found myself thinking that is was also the perfect day for ice cream. Magda beat me to it, by asking if I wanted to stop at McDonald's for some. They have walk-up windows, and a cone is only 45 cents! I am tickled by this and get them often. We sat in the sun on the steps of a university building to eat.

Lac Vert

A Green Lake morning

when the lake is still and hushed,

like a child in wonder.

All is silent except the wind

in the trees,

and I wonder if I am alone in the world.

But ah, the loon gives her crazy call and I know I am joined

by at least one.

Solitude does not last long – or does it? –

for from my spot

on the porch

I soon hear the cabin rustling to life.

Sister creaking down the stairs from our shared bedroom in the loft.

Dogs nails clicking on the wooden floors.

Door thrown open

as someone treks to the john.

Murmured good mornings.

Stretching.

The lake awakens with the cabin.

An errant breeze ripples the silky surface.

A seagull lands

jauntily

on our floating dock.

A boat motors across the lake,

out for an early morning fish.

I pause

from my reading

and look up to see the sun breaking

through the clouds

over Alligear’s Bay.

This Green Lake morning is slipping into a Green Lake day.

A Green Lake day is not confined

by the constraints of time.

Oh, time passes, sure,

but here it’s not measured

in hours or minutes.

We’ve no clock, see.

The day ambles on,

and it’s quite freeing – though at first perhaps unsettling –

to not know

that now it’s noon and so we must eat lunch.

canoe to the island

swim off the cliffs

rig up a worm and fish from shore

Go ahead.

Do what you like.

The day is yours, after all, and not the clock’s.

It doesn’t matter when you eat

or for how long you nap

or if you read all day in a paint-peeled rocker on the porch.

One thing is certain, though.

Boats launch at sunset.

I always sit in the point of the Alumacraft

my dad, the captain, at the helm.

We might troll Dead Head Alley,

pretending to be a school of hook-laced minnows,

or maybe we try casting jitterbugs at the inlet.

As our hands get cold on the reels

and our feet slosh in water at the bottom of the boat,

we point her toward a faint light across the bay

and are cabin bound.

Time for a Green Lake night.

A Green Lake night means

laughter

on the porch

as stories are traded,

retold,

exaggerated.

The clink of bottles

Maybe we’ll have a fire.

We tend to the insatiable flames and

alternately look skyward.

We see the stars as we see them only up here.

The sky looks like silver paint splattered

on a blue-black canvas.

The number of stars is staggering, really,

with no man-made lights to rival their twinkling.

Sometimes, instead, we play cards

at the table

by the rosy glow from an ancient oil lamp.

We pound the table when someone scoops

a trick with Big Ben.

And we laugh.

And eat crackers and cheese

And the brave ones try ‘dines.

After good nights are said,

I slip into my bed

under the crazy quilts Grandma made

years ago.

Flashlights click off

as the cabin settles.

I close my eyes

and then open them

but it makes no difference,

the darkness is absolute.

My eyes close

not to open again until it’s time for

another Green Lake Morning

Messages from Wild Geese

Yesterday's post reminded me of a poem.

Wild Geese 

by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

Every time I read this poem a different line speaks to me. I love the idea that while we experience personal despair the world continues. And this seeming indifference isn't cruel, but rather ideal because everyone is always welcome to crawl out of their place of despair and rejoin life and its joys. We do not have to be good. We just have to BE.

Even though I love this poem, I find it challenging to pull my half-formed thoughts together in a way that I can share with others. Does anyone have any ideas they would like to share?