Come run away with me

I was having a light conversation about Pablo Neruda's writings with XXX a while back. Now this was a writer we both could relate to because his poetry just oozes immense longing and love lost. And there is this particular poem we both have a liking for and everytime we read it, it puts a hint of ache in our hearts:

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SADDEST POEM
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I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.

Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."

The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.

To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass.

What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.

That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.

As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.

The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.

I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.

Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.

Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.

Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her.
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Halfway through the conversation, she popped me a surprising question:

"Say Seth... would you run away with me? Just the 2 of us to Chile, to his birth village and watch the sun set/rise on the place he grew up in or to Argentina and hang out at his favorite cafe, drinking coffee and smoking cigars. Would you do that for me? Run away with me and leave everything behind?"

I thought about it and smiled, "I WOULD.. you know I will.. I'm a hardcore romanticist like that *laughs* That is if I've gotten my priorities in place..."

"Oh? And what would you priorities be?"

"Well, lets just say.. a few million ringgit in the bank. Have to make sure when I come back after 10 years of travelling.. I won't have to work my ass off just to get by in my old age. And a few sons to carry on the family name, heck I'm a traditionalist like that..."

She laughed, "Well I guess in that case.. it will be never then!~"

"Well never is kinda premature and harsh conclusion", I added, "maybe later, when we're 40 or something..." I rolled my eyes and smiled.

She laughed harder this time, "What... and leave my kids and husband behind? Well, that is IF I do get married at all and IF you could drag yourself away from your family!~"

We both laughed silently at our own glowing monitor and sat back to absorb to idea. Maybe we would make it happen, because longinglovedesire is a two way thing after all...



Track Of The Day: No Doubt - Running