LOVE SONNET 17

INTRODUCTION
In A Nutshell
In the fourteen lines that make up "Love Sonnet 17," Pablo Neruda uses the
word "love" nine times. So yeah, we're going to go ahead and call this a love
poem. The fact that it's written in Spanish – a language of love – makes it all
the more romantic, but it's not totally suave. In fact, it wouldn't be Neruda if it
weren't a little strange: in the poem, the speaker attempts to define loves is
some rather odd ways, and, well, he fails. Can't win 'em all.
The Chilean poet Pablo Neruda was one of the premier South American poets
of the twentieth century, and has come to be recognized as one of the most
famous Spanish-speaking poets of all time. He had a gift for writing about
love, a talent he first showcased in 1924 (when he was only 19!) when he
published 20 Love Poems and a Song of Despair (Veinte poemas de amor y
una canción desesperada), a book that contained twenty love poems and, as
you might have guessed, a song of despair.
While Neruda is best-known these days for his beautifully sensual and erotic
love poetry, he did write about other things. He was active in Chilean politics
for much of his life, and his poetry explores a very wide range of historical
subjects, much of it tinged with his strong communist beliefs. In the 1960s,
when Neruda began to be recognized in the United States, it was primarily his
political poetry that brought him attention (largely because of the political
turmoil in the US at the time).
"Love Sonnet 17" is part of Neruda's collection of 100 Love Sonnets,
published in 1960 as Cien sonetos de amor. Neruda divided the book into four
parts, Morning (Mañana), Afternoon (Mediodía), Evening (Tarde), and Night
(Noche), and number 17 found its way into Morning. This sonnet, along with
the other ninety-nine, was written for Matilde Urrutia, Neruda's third wife.
(We're not sure if being married three times makes him more or less qualified
to write about love.) But their love wasn't as pure as the poem might make it
seem: Neruda actually cheated on his second wife with Urrutia. Maybe that's
the secret he keeps talking about? You decide.
 
 WHY SHOULD I CARE?
No matter how hard we (and every cheesy romantic comedy writer on earth)
try, we can't ever seem to define love. Pablo Neruda gives it another shot in
"Love Sonnet 17," but he can't seem to get it either – and he's a poet, for
crying out loud. What we learn from this poem is that love is a mystery no
matter how particular we get. It's not just a matter of distinguishing between
love for precious gems and love for humans (which Neruda does), it's about
trying to understand your own personal experience with love; and here, the
speaker just can't do it. No matter how secure we are in our in our love for
someone (like, say, their hands are our hands and their eyes see our
dreams), that doesn't mean we can explain this love in words. We just feel it.

We could summarize this poem in four words: this guy's in love. But we'll give
you a little more, just so you know what to expect.
The speaker is addressing his lover, and begins by saying that he doesn't love
her in the way that someone would love beautiful flowers or gems. Great; so
how does he love her? Well, first, he loves her in secret. Scandalous! He also
loves her as if she were a flower that wasn't in bloom, which is full of beauty
on the inside. And in fact, that flower (his lover) produces an aroma that he
carries inside of him. A rather interesting metaphor, don't you think?
After spending the first eight lines trying to describe his love, Neruda uses the
remaining six lines to raise the white flag: he can't explain his love, he just
plain loves this girl. His love is simple and humble. The speaker ends with the
image of him and his lover, intertwined, as if they were one body and one
soul. He may not be able to define his love, but his attempts sure are
evocative

Lines 1-2
I do not love you as though you were the salt-rose, topaz
Or the carnation-arrow begot in flames.

 This "love sonnet" opens with the speaker talking to his paramour
(another word for lover). We don’t know if he’s talking to his wife, or
girlfriend, or boyfriend, or illicit lover.
 Neruda did dedicate the Love Sonnets, however, to his wife Matilde
Urrutia, so we can guess that he’s speaking to her.
  In any case, this is considered a direct address: the speaker uses the
second person point of view to speak directly to the addressee of the
poem.
 First, the speaker describes the ways in which he does not love this
woman. Interesting strategy, but it will definitely provide some contrast
for what comes later.
 Salt-rose most likely refers to a type of rose that grows near the ocean
(and salt water, hence the name) and is especially resistant to a
number of diseases roses commonly suffer. It is also sometimes called
the rosa rugosa, or salt spray rose.
 Topaz is a mineral that comes in a variety of colors: reddish orange,
yellow, bluish-brown. It's usually quite pretty.
 "Carnation-arrow begot in flames" is a tricky phrase. The speaker is
describing, in a very poetic way, the brightness of a carnation (a type of
flower). He compares looking at the flower to seeing an shiny arrow
that's flaming like fire.
 We should tell you that translators sometimes get this whole carnation
thing wrong. It is common to see it rendered as "or the arrow of
carnations the fire shoots off." This really just isn’t correct. The Spanish
reads "O flecha de claveles que propagan el fuego," which literally
means, "or the arrow of carnations that spread/propagate fire."
 Now that we know what all our natural references are, what does the
speaker mean by it all? Basically, he is saying that his love for his
paramour is not the same as the love one has for beautiful things like
precious metals and flowers. Seems pretty self-explanatory, but it gets
more complicated as the poem continues.
 Because roses and carnations are are common symbols of love and
affection, the speaker might also be using this as a way to show the
uniqueness of his love. His love isn't any old rose or carnation. What is
it then?

Lines 3-4
I love you as are loved certain dark things,
In secret, between shadow and soul.

 Now the speaker starts to describe the way in which he does love his
paramour. He loves her the way people love "dark things," "in secret,
between shadow and soul."
 This is all very strange: what, exactly, are "dark things"? We don’t
know, and the speaker doesn’t tell us, but it sounds like he’s talking
about something sinister, something you wouldn’t admit to loving.
  "Between shadow and soul" doesn’t help us much either: he's talking
about the place where these dark things are loved, but we're not sure
exactly where it is.
 This secret place is external (like a shadow) but also deep down inside
(like a soul). Confusing, but at least it sounds really cool. Hmmm,
maybe that’s the point.
 It's also possible that Neruda is actually talking about loving someone
in secret – like an affair. He allegedly cheated on his second wife with
Matilde Urrutia (who this poem is about), so it could be that secret just
means secret. Plain and simple.
 If that's the case, then the gap between shadow and soul might
represent the conflict between the impossibility of hiding his love (like a
shadow, which is there whether you like it or not) and the secrecy of his
feelings (which he keeps hidden in his soul).

Lines 5-6
I love you as the plant that does not flourish, and carries
Hidden within itself the light of its flowers;

 Time for some more 4-1-1 on the speaker’s love. This time he loves his
lady as if she were a barren plant, one that does not "flourish" (in
Spanish, the word is florecer, to bloom) but keeps its beauty, the "light
of its flowers," hidden.
 "I love you as" means, "I love you as if you were" or "I love you like I
love the plant that."
 The image here reminds us a little of a flower in the winter: it isn't in
bloom, and looks almost dead, but we know that in the spring all that
"hidden" beauty will appear.
 Speaking of hidden beauty, he might be referring to his lover's internal
beauty. We already know he doesn't love her like he loves beautiful
flowers and gems (remember the first stanza?), so his love isn't the
superficial kind. It's what's on the inside that counts.

Lines 7-8
And, thanks to your love, there lives darkly in me
The quickening aroma that rose from the soil.

 As a result of the paramour’s love, a "quickening aroma" now lives

"darkly" (or secretly) within the speaker.
 This is very sensual, but also bizarre. What "aroma…rose from the
soil"?
  It sounds like the speaker is describing a plant sprouting from the
earth; probably that barren plant we met before. The aroma that results
from the new growth of a plant becomes a metaphor to describe the
feeling of love. New love, perhaps.
 The word "quickening" makes us think of the passion of new love; once
it starts, it almost explodes into something beautiful.
 Being loved by somebody is like smelling a new flower. And apparently
Neruda likes the secretive parts of new love. He's not shouting it from
the rooftops; instead, he's carrying the feeling inside him.
 We notice here that Neruda is invoking the sense of smell. This is a
very sensory poem: he also references sight and touch quite a bit (can
you find those lines?). You'll notice that all of our "Symbols" are
sensory ones!

Get out the microscope, because we’re going

through this poem line-by-line.

Lines 9-10
I love you . . . I don't know how or when or where.
I simply love you, no problem, no pride.

 Here's what it boils down to: the speaker loves this woman, plain and
simple. He doesn’t know the specifics; he "simply" loves her.
 Is the speaker suggesting that he can’t explain why he loves the
paramour? Sounds like it. This is a common problem we all have. It's
not easy to define love or to explain it away – we just feel it, right?
 "No problem, no pride"? Hmmm. This sounds odd in a love poem, but it
seems to be some kind of comment on the purity of the speaker’s love:
he's humble and his love is legit. No drama, please. Or so he says.
 The idea of having "no pride" in love will pop up again later in the
poem, so keep it in mind.
 The ninth line of a Petrarchan sonnet is usually supposed to change
the direction of the poem. Sometimes it offers a resolution to the
problems posed in the first eight lines, or it just marks a shift in tone. It
is often called the volta (in Italian), or turn.
 Do you think the poem shifts gears in line 9?

Lines 11-12
I love you thus because I love no other way,
Except this way, in which I am not and you are not.

 The speaker explains why he loves his paramour the way he does.
Answer? Because it's the only way he knows how. He can only love
when "I am not and you are not."
 This sounds like a very powerful love in which the two lovers become
one person; they cease to be their individual selves and instead
become one.
 This reminds us of the whole "I simply love you, no problem, no pride"
thing from line 10. Without any pride in a relationship, the two
individuals are able to forget about their own self-interests and focus on
the couple instead.
 There seems to be a faint echo here of the first book of the Bible,
Genesis. In that super important and often-referenced book, marriage
is described as a union in which the bride and groom become "one
flesh."
 You'll also notice that this is the third time the words "I love you" have
opened a line in the poem. This repetition of words at the beginnings of
lines is called anaphora. What effect does it have on the poem?
 A cool note on structure: in order to get to the end of the sentence that
starts in line 11, you have to move from the third to the fourth stanza,
from the first to the second tercet. What is the effect of this structure?
Why didn't Neruda make the content of the stanzas align with their
structure?

Lines 13-14
So close that your hand on my chest is mine, 
So close that your eyes close on my dreams.

 The speaker further describes the way he loves: he and his paramour
are so close that they switch body parts. Her hand is his, and her eyes
see his dreams.
 Obviously this is physically impossible, but it’s the speaker’s beautifully
metaphorical way of describing the ways in which lovers share every
part of themselves.
 It is a love in which there are no barriers; the speaker and his paramour
are completely open with each other.
 You know when you're holding someone's hand and you look down
and can't tell whose fingers are whose? That's kind of what this is like.
 We’ll give you the Spanish so you can see how pretty it is too: "Tan
cerca que tu mano sobre mi pecho es mía, / Tan cerca que se cierran
tus ojos con mi sueño."
  Notice that each of the final two lines of the poem start with the words
"So close" (Tan cerca). This is another instance of anaphora (when
words are repeated at the beginning of lines.) Why do you think Neruda
chose to do this? And why now, at the end of the poem?

Sonnet, Free Verse

It is nearly impossible to retain the meter of the original language when
translating poetry. On occasion translators attempt to do so, but the gap is
nearly unbridgeable. Because of that, we won't talk about the meter of the
translation and we'll jump right into the original.

Just an Old-Fashioned Love Sonnet

Neruda’s poem is a sonnet, a distinguished and popular poetic form with
fourteen lines. There are many different types of sonnets, but the two most
common are the Petrarchan and Shakespearean or English sonnet. You
might be familiar with the man who gave his name to the Shakespearean
sonnet, but there's also a man behind the Petrarchan form. Francesco
Petrarca (1304-1374) wrote many sonnets about a mysterious woman named
Laura, and he's often credited with popularizing the sonnet form.
The Petrarchan sonnet is divided into two parts. The first eight lines are called
the octave and usually pose a problem of some kind. The last six are called
the sextet, and they generally offer some kind of resolution to the problem
posed in the octave. Problem-focused coping, here we come. This shift in
gears between the octave and the sextet is often called the volta, or turn. Can
you find it in "Love Sonnet 17"?
Neruda's poem follows this form pretty well: it is divided into two quatrains (a
group of four lines), and then two tercets (a group of three lines). This is
basically an octave and a sextet, right? The first eight lines are filled with
metaphors, as the speaker tries to explain his love (the problem). The last six
lines show us that the speaker is resigned to the fact that it's just not possible
(resolution). This certainly isn't your normal problem-resolution, but hey,
nothing about Neruda's sonnets is normal.

… But Without the Rhyme

In a normal Petrarchan sonnet, the octave's rhyme scheme is usually ABBA
ABBA, and the sextet can have a variety of rhymes schemes (two common
ones are CDE CDE and CDC CDC). Well, Neruda didn't like these options. In
fact, he didn't seem to like any option: his poem just doesn't rhyme. It does
include a couple rhymes (think "tierra" [8] and "manera" [11]), but it's not
sustained throughout the piece. Why do you think Neruda chose not to rhyme
this poem?

ANALYSIS: SPEAKER
It's pretty obvious that our speaker is in love. But since he spends all his time
talking about this love (and in particular, the woman he loves), we don't hear
much about the man himself. Still, through his words we're able to get a sense
of what kind of guy we're dealing with.
We're pretty sure this is an adult – maybe even an old man – because his love
is incredibly mature. He doesn't love this woman because of the way she
looks, but because of what's on the inside. His maturity also shines through
when he conveys that this woman's love for him is just as important as his
love for her ("thanks to your love" [7]). It's not all about him, it's about the
relationship.
Don't worry, "Love Sonnet 17" is not all about boring adult love. The speaker
is also a pretty passionate guy. He likes to have secrets (that makes love a
little steamier, probably) and he imagines his love growing inside him in a truly
physical sense. This is a man who has thought a lot about love, both
emotionally and physically.
One last thought: could it be that the speaker of this poem represents both
sides of a relationship? Because there is no distinguishing the individual (they
are one, remember?) either person in the relationship could be speaking this
poem. Gives it another layer, right?

ANALYSIS: SOUND CHECK

We can't really base the sound of this poem off the English translation (sound
is very particular to each language). So we suggest you listen to the poem in
its original language to get a sense of how it sounds. Still, there are some
pretty obvious sounds that are carried over into the translation. For example
the "o" sound that repeats throughout (in both the Spanish and the translation)
is a very soothing sound (think "ommm"); this adds to the sense of comfort
and intimacy that the poem conveys.
Another important aspect to the sound of this poem is the pauses. You'll
notice that there are a lot of commas (which usually indicate a pause) even in
the middle of lines. If you read the poem out loud, you'll find yourself pausing
as you would in normal conversation – that is, often, and without regularity.
Once again, this increases the sense of intimacy: it's as if we're listening in on
a private conversation (or one side of it, at least) between two lovers.

ANALYSIS: SETTING

Where It All Goes Down

"Love Sonnet 17" is an incredibly intimate poem, so we imagine an incredibly
intimate setting. Perhaps the speaker is actually intertwined with his lover in
the way he describes at the end of his poem:
so close that your hand on my chest is mine,
so close that your eyes close on my dreams. (13-14)
In any case, the setting is probably quite quiet and even isolated. This love
that the speaker describes is hidden and secret, and so the couple is almost
surely not walking down the street together or shouting from the rooftops.
More likely, they are in bed together, alone, and becoming one.

ANALYSIS: WHAT'S UP WITH

THE TITLE?
Neruda’s poem is often referred to simply as "Love Sonnet 17," which means
that it’s the seventeenth sonnet in a larger group (in this case, 100).
Sometimes, however, it is referred to by its first line, "I do not love you as
though you were the salt-rose, topaz." Let’s take this as the unofficial title for
now. As it turns out, this first sentence explains a lot about the poem. "Love
Sonnet 17" is largely the poet’s attempt to define his love for his paramour,
and so he starts off by describing what it is not. His love is not a love that is
focused on things like color, shape, and other external features. It is a love
that is based on a deep, "hidden" beauty that not everybody can see. This
hidden beauty is much more important, in the long run, and excites feelings
and passions that defy description.

ANALYSIS: CALLING CARD

Mysterious and Erotic Love Poetry
Neruda is one of the greatest poets of the twentieth century, and his love
poetry has earned him a pretty good reputation. While he's always incredibly
passionate, a lot of what he says, both in "Love Sonnet 17" and elsewhere in
the 100 Love Sonnets, is a bit mysterious, even mystical. In "Love Sonnet 17,"
for example, he likens his feelings to an "aroma that rose darkly from the soil,"
which suggests that love is like some infectious odor-plant that takes over
one’s whole being. That’s pretty mysterious, but also deeply erotic, not to
mention strangely beautiful. This fusion of mystery and eroticism is a hallmark
of Neruda’s love poetry and, arguably, the reason for its extraordinary
popularity.

ANALYSIS: TOUGH-O-
METER
(2) Sea Level
Love poetry is nothing new, sure, but Neruda does love poetry in his own,
unique way that can make him seem more difficult than he really is. The
poem’s language itself is pretty straightforward, with the exception of a few
odd words like "quickening." The trickiest parts of Neruda’s poem are the
metaphors, which sometimes leave you scratching your head. In this poem,
for example, Neruda compares the feelings he has to an "aroma that rose
from the soil." Huh? Usually, though, Neruda is on to something; just think of
the way a smell can be so infectious, and you’ll start to see why "aroma"
makes sense. So, in short, give Neruda a chance and we guarantee you'll
figure him out (with a little help from Shmoop).