**Poetry Analysis Example

Hey gang: this is not for the blog, but for class.  Since we will not be able to talk more about the Neruda poem in class tomorrow, I wanted to post this for you to peruse to your heart's content.  This is my analysis of the poem, and I want you to do your own version of this for the midterm on Wednesday.  You will not write as much, of course, because my essays are always too wordy.  Notice that I touch on pretty much every line of the poem, that I explain the quotations directly after each reference, and that I have an overall analysis of the poem and its message.  I didn't use MIST (Message: Imagery, Symbols, Tone) because this poem doesn't match that very well; there isn't very much symbolism and most of the images are vague.  I also didn't go through it from beginning to end, though that would have worked fairly well in this case; I used a different structure, going from one major feeling to another to another.  It is a bit confusing, but that works because that is how the poem is set up, too.  Your essays should be simpler and more straightforward: stick to explaining the poem, don't try to wow me with your writing.

First, the poem in question:

Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, 'The night is shattered, and the blue stars shiver in the distance.
The night wind revolves in the sky and sings.


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.
Through nights like this one I held her in my arms.
I kissed her again and again under the endless sky.


She loved me, and sometimes I loved her too.
How could one not have loved her great still eyes?


Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.
To hear the immense night, still more immense without her,
And the verse falls to the snow like dew to the pasture.


What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
That night is shattered and she is not with me.
This is all.
In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.


My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
My sight searches for her as though to go to her.
My heart looks for her, and she is not with me.


The same night whitening the same trees.
We, of that time, are no longer the same.
I no longer love her, that is certain, but how I loved her.
My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing.


Another's. She will be another's.
Like my kisses before.
Her voice. Her bright body. Her infinite eyes.


I no longer love her, that is certain, but maybe I love her.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.
Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms.


My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her.
Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer,

And these the last verses that I write for her.

And here's my essay.

Analysis of "Puedo escribir los versos mas triste esta noche" by Pablo Neruda


"'Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all." So the saying goes. And I'm sure it's true -- though it's one of those paradoxes that could never be confirmed, because one person can only experience one side, never both -- but it doesn't tell the whole story, does it? That line makes it seem as though love is lost, it hurts a lot, but then you move on to your fond reminiscences and your serene wisdom, knowing you've got it better than those poor saps who never loved at all. But that isn't what it feels like when love ends. Because the end of the relationship may come quickly, may even be that "clean break" that people claim to want -- but the end of the love? That can take forever, and it's never easy; in many cases, love's ending may never be complete. To get the whole story, then, we need to turn to another poet, another poem: Pablo Neruda's "Tonight I can Write the Saddest Lines." This poem shows just what it feels like when you come out of a relationship, but still feel the love -- well, maybe you still feel the love. Maybe not.

The key description of this poem is "Confused." The poem reflects what one feels after the end of love, after all, and that is almost always the key word for that experience: confused. Was it my fault? Was it hers? Should we have broken up at all? Should we have stayed away from each other from the beginning? Did I make too much of that? Too little? Am I happier now? Is she? Do I want her to be? Neruda's speaker shows this continual questioning and self-contradiction throughout the poem: in line 5, he says, "I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too." Then in line 8: "She loved me, sometimes I loved her too." In line 23, he says, "I no longer love her, that's certain, but how I loved her." But by line 28, that has become, "I no longer love her, that's certain, but maybe I love her." Clearly this man has no idea how he feels for her, and not much more of an idea about how she feels for him. Their love might have been stronger on his side, or maybe it was hers; maybe it was sometimes one, sometimes the other. Maybe that first contradiction refers to different kinds of love -- a companionable love that stayed strong throughout, and a passionate love that was sometimes there, and sometimes gone. But the point is, the speaker doesn't know.

He's not even sure what happened to end the relationship, or whose fault it may have been: in line 11, he seems to think it is his fault, that he did something that made her leave him or that he wasn't good enough for her (Though perhaps she should have been more forgiving? Less demanding?): "To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her." But five lines later, he changes from blaming himself (maybe), to saying it doesn't matter what happened: "What does it matter that my love could not keep her./ The night is shattered and she is not with me./ This is all." All that matters is that she is not with him; why she is gone is nothing. This magnanimous feeling is gone by the end, however, when the speaker puts on his bitter face: "Though this be the last pain that she makes me suffer/ And these the last verses that I write for her." Clearly it's all her fault that he's suffering like this, and he's done with it. He's written verses for her (Are these for her? Is he planning to show her these, maybe show her how much he hurts without her -- maybe even convince her to come back? Naaah. That couldn't be. He's done with her, right?), but no more!

Yeah, right. Sounds to me like someone's trying to convince himself.

Despite the confusion and contradictions, though, there are some aspects of the love described in this poem that come through very clearly. Whatever the man may feel for his lost lover, it is clear that on this night, he is in pain. Right from the beginning, he says, "Tonight I can write the saddest lines./ Write, for example, 'The night is shattered and the blue stars shiver in the distance.'" This is, indeed, one of the saddest lines, and the saddest images, I have ever heard: the blue stars shiver in the distance, cold and empty and lonely, rather than the romantic, lovely icons the stars should be. He misses her, and longs for what they once had. "Through nights like this one I held her in my arms./ I kissed her again and again under the endless sky." "To hear the immense night, still more immense without her." "Because through nights like this one I held her in my arms." However, despite missing the love these two once shared -- the intimacy, the physical affection, and his enjoyment of her beauty, apparent in the lines "How could one not have loved her great still eyes." and "Her voice, her bright body. Her infinite eyes." -- the speaker is not really sure that he should long for her. There is anger here, both in that final denial -- the last pain she makes me suffer, the last verses I write for her -- and in the lines, "Another's. She will be another's. Like my kisses before." This is a man fraught with jealousy, and maybe just a little guilt (Who did his kisses belong to, exactly?). He seems to say that they have changed and moved on, even though he is reminded of her: "The same night whitening the same trees./ We, of that time, are no longer the same." The world around them is the same world, but the two of them are not the people they were when they were together; perhaps they cannot find what they once had -- perhaps they should not try. But then, he seeks her out, just as he once had: "...but how I loved her./ My voice tried to find the wind to touch her hearing." That is in the past tense, when the two were an item, whereas these three lines, in the present, show that this need to reach her has not fallen away with the breakup: "My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her./ My sight searches for her as though to go to her. / My heart looks for her, and she is not with me." But the end of that last line shows that, try as he might, the situation is final: she is not with him.

The key to this poem, and the situation it depicts, is in one short line, near the end, almost lost amongst the heartache and nostalgia. It is one of the few lines that does not refer directly to the woman he loved, though obviously it is about her: "Love is so short, forgetting is so long." This is the point Neruda is trying to make in this poem, and the one piece of wisdom that most people come away with after similar experiences in life. It doesn't matter how long a relationship lasts, or how it ends; if it is intense enough, genuine enough, to be called love, then those feelings live on long after the two people can't stand to be in the same room together. The love might be mixed with hurt and betrayal and anger and even disgust, or it may just fade and be supplanted by a newer, stronger love -- but still, no matter what, it's there, for a long, long time, and little things can bring it all welling back up -- "In the distance, someone is singing. In the distance." The speaker in this poem tries to deny it, tries to reject it, but he can't -- because through nights like this one, he held her in his arms. Because he loved her, and because he lost her, tonight, he can write the saddest lines.