I was in Love With Pablo Neruda.

I was in Love With Pablo Neruda

I was in love with Pablo Neruda

For many long years.

We sat side by side in a café, talking

Of promises-of great, puffy clouds that sail

Through a blue sky, of a night full of stars

That stare down at us like eyes.

I have had different loves, but none was

Quite the same as this: holding hands tenderly

As we strolled down farmer’s market,

Talking of blank pages and poetry,

Talking of misadventures of being English professors

At campuses that were not for poets like us.

He was a published poet, and I, I was not.

But still, he read my poetry with ease,

As the great ones always do, and he spoke of me

Lovingly to his sister, the one who kept his promises.

She became his caregiver, in the end,

And on the bitter nights when I was alone,

After he was gone, gone as in dead,

I would sit in my rocker at my house,

Staring into space, staring at nothing, dreaming

Of the days we spent together, over stale cigarettes and red

Wine.