Tonight I Can Write by Pablo Neruda - Explanation
The poem "Tonight I can Write" is written by Pablo Neruda, a renowned poet of the 20th century and a Nobel Laureate. The poem is part of the collection of poems known as "Twenty Love Poems And A Song Of Despair", published in 1924.
The poem deals with the narrator's melancholic outburst after the departure of his beloved. He wants to write a sad verse on his mental distress.
The narrator begins the poem by saying that that day he would write his "most saddest lines" as he would put all his mental pain and heartbreaking emotions on the paper. He attributes his anguish to the non-living objects in nature such as that :
" The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance"
This figure of speech is called Transfer Epithet. He admits that he love her and she loved him too. They had enjoyed physical intimacy between them. He loved her "great still eyes". He regrets his loss, he doesn't give any reason what happened to her? Did she choose another man over him? At the point we don't know.
The night seems immense to him because of his beloved's absence and this agony works as a muse to write verse like "dew to the pasture."
It doesn't matter to him that his love could not stop her, his soul refuses to believe it. So he waits for her and his eyes and heart are keen to see her wherever he goes. He remembers that when they were together, the night was so starry that its glow "whiten" the trees. Now everything is same around but them. He is alone and incomplete without her.
The narrator has a conflict, he still loves her but he wants to move on but it's not possible to not love her anymore. He confesses that he will miss her kisses and sensual love when she will be married to another person. He laments the short duration of the love part and the need of a long period to move on.
The night reminds him that once how he held her in his arms and loved her, now his soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
He believes it will be the last time he would suffer due to her memories because he wants to pour all his grief in his verse and announces that this would be the last time, he would write about her.
The poem deals with the narrator's melancholic outburst after the departure of his beloved. He wants to write a sad verse on his mental distress.
The narrator begins the poem by saying that that day he would write his "most saddest lines" as he would put all his mental pain and heartbreaking emotions on the paper. He attributes his anguish to the non-living objects in nature such as that :
" The night is shattered
and the blue stars shiver in the distance"
This figure of speech is called Transfer Epithet. He admits that he love her and she loved him too. They had enjoyed physical intimacy between them. He loved her "great still eyes". He regrets his loss, he doesn't give any reason what happened to her? Did she choose another man over him? At the point we don't know.
The night seems immense to him because of his beloved's absence and this agony works as a muse to write verse like "dew to the pasture."
It doesn't matter to him that his love could not stop her, his soul refuses to believe it. So he waits for her and his eyes and heart are keen to see her wherever he goes. He remembers that when they were together, the night was so starry that its glow "whiten" the trees. Now everything is same around but them. He is alone and incomplete without her.
The narrator has a conflict, he still loves her but he wants to move on but it's not possible to not love her anymore. He confesses that he will miss her kisses and sensual love when she will be married to another person. He laments the short duration of the love part and the need of a long period to move on.
The night reminds him that once how he held her in his arms and loved her, now his soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
He believes it will be the last time he would suffer due to her memories because he wants to pour all his grief in his verse and announces that this would be the last time, he would write about her.