Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines

 "Tonight I Can Write the Saddest Lines" (also known as "Poem 20") is one of the most famous works by the Nobel Prize-winning Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. Published in 1924 as part of his collection Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair, the poem was written when Neruda was only 19 years old.

Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines 

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 sometimes, and 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 soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.

The 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's 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 voide. Her bright body. Her inifinite eyes.

I no longer love her, that's 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 sould 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.

Tonight I Can Write The Saddest Lines  Summary

"Tonight I Can Write the Saddest Lines" (Poem XX) is one of Pablo Neruda’s most famous works from his 1924 collection, Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair. It is a haunting exploration of lost love, memory, and the painful process of moving on.

Here is a summary of the poem’s key themes and progression:

1. The Paradox of Writing

The speaker begins by stating he can write the "saddest lines" tonight, but the poem itself is a struggle. He uses the act of writing to try and capture the vastness of his grief. He looks at the "shattered" blue stars and feels the cold wind, using the night sky as a mirror for his internal loneliness.

2. The Memory of Possession

The heart of the poem lies in the repetition of the phrase "I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too." He recalls the nights he held her and kissed her "under the endless sky." He is mourning not just the woman, but the intimacy they once shared.

3. The Pain of Absence

The speaker's perspective shifts as he realizes she is gone. The night feels even more immense and empty without her. He admits:

The Struggle to Forget: He famously writes, "Love is so short, forgetting is so long." * The Changed Self: He notes that "we, of that time, are no longer the same." Both the lovers and the love itself have been altered by time and distance.

4. Acceptance and Finality

By the end of the poem, the speaker observes that she will belong to another, just as she did before his kisses. In a final attempt to reclaim his peace, he declares that this will be the last pain she causes him and these will be the last verses he writes for her.