I want to see the thirst inside the syllables I want to touch the fire in the sound: I want to feel the darkness of the cry. I want words as rough as virgin rocks.” - Verb.
Interpretation
The quote expresses a desire for authentic and raw emotional expression in poetry.
In this quote, Pablo Neruda articulates a longing for poetry that captures the intense and unrefined aspects of human experience. He desires words that convey deep feelings, evoke powerful imagery, and resonate with the primal emotions of existence. By comparing words to natural elements, he emphasizes the depth and richness of language that can express the complexities of life and emotion.
In practice
This quote could be used in a creative writing workshop to inspire poets to explore raw emotions in their work.
Perhaps this war will pass like the others which divided us leaving us dead, killing us along with the killers but the shame of this time puts its burning fingers to our faces. Who will erase the ruthlessness hidden in innocent blood?
Only do not forget, if I wake up crying it's only because in my dream I'm a lost child hunting through the leaves of the night for your hands.
And here am I, budding among the ruins with only sorrow to bite on, as if weeping were a seed and I the earth's only furrow.
Once more I am the silent one who came out of the distance wrapped in cold rain and bells: I owe to earth's pure death the will to sprout.
I learned about life from life itself, love I learned in a single kiss and could teach no one anything except that I have lived with something in common among men.
I have named you queen. There are taller than you, taller. There are purer than you, purer. There are lovelier than you, lovelier. But you are the queen.
I was always a storyteller. I just didn't know it. I never shared the stories I made up inside my head when I was growing up. I never wrote them down, either. But I can't remember a time when they weren't there.
I remember the first time I went to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and saw a Kerry James Marshall painting with black bodies in it on a museum wall... It strengthened me on a cellular level.
When I write, I don't know what is going to emerge. I begin in a condition of complete unknowing, an utter nakedness of concept or goal. A word appears, another word appears, an image. It is a moving into mystery.
Because I cannot work except in solitude, it is necessary that I live my work and that is impossible except in solitude.
The production of a work of art is determined by the material and intellectual climate in which a man lives and dies.
In business sharp practice sometimes succeeds, but in art honesty is not only the best but the only policy.
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