Odes to Common Things (1994)

With this book the great Chilean poet renounces definitely his initial surrealism. The collection of more than fifty poems is preceded by "El hombre invisible".

What a beautiful book - poetry, illustrations, side-by-side languages. ( )

This is a beautifully illustrated collection of Pablo Neruda's Odes to Common Things. As a teacher, this is one book that could be used to teach illustration, attention to detail, appreciation of the small things both by using the book's illustrations as a good example, and through the poetry, to have students see the variety of imagery available even in things they see every day. The only downside I could even come up with in regard to this book was that the bilingual portions would not work well with an english only classroom. ( )

Ode to a Book of Poetry

Poems ennoble
the ordinary:
this chair, this table,
the guitar, the gillyflower,
a bar of soap,
a pair of socks,
the dictionary,
the spoon or plate,
the artichoke,
an onion or tomato.

A common cat
is an emperor
a conqueror,
a parlor tiger,
nuptial sultan.

Tiny violets
deliver something
out of the soil,
“nocturnal bouquet
nestled in green leaves.”

Our world
is an orange,
round like the sun,
out of many, one.

A pair of scissors
has cut clothes
for newlyweds
and for the dead,
peasants’ hair,
the thread
from your navel,
handing you
“your separate existence,”
pieces of happiness
and (face it)
also sadness.

Dictionaries
are granaries
of words.

As the queen
knights a commoner;
as the right to vote
grants each citizen
sovereignty;
as a spotlight,
at least for a moment,
crowns a dancer,
or a momument
preserves a name
beyond departure,

so words in order,
set in lines to time,
carefully crafted
and gently spoken,
for once,
just this once,
lift what’s little,
what’s often forgotten,
what’s overlooked
in its dailiness,
into sublimity.

“A panoply of spoons”
shines over all
the world,
bringing life
in loveliness—
we hardly notice.

This anthology,
Odes to Common Things
by Pablo Neruda
(Bullfinch Press, 2004)
is a democracy
of images,
a verbal
aristocracy.

This? I love this. ( )