Saturday's Poem: Love Crosses Its Islands

morning sky

Love Crosses Its Islands by Pablo Neruda (translated by Stephen Tapscott)

Love crosses its islands, from grief to grief,
it sets its roots, watered with tears,
and no one––no one––can escape the heart’s progress
as it runs, silent and carnivorous.

You and I search for a wide valley, for another planet
where the salt wouldn’t touch your hair,
where sorrows couldn’t grow because of anything I did,
where bread could live and not grow old.

A planet entwined with vistas and foliage,
a plain, a rock, hard and unoccupied:
we wanted to build a strong nest

with our own hands, without hurt or harm or speech,
but love was not like that: love was a lunatic city
with crowds of people blanching on their porches.