To the shrouded heart...

The remnants of Alberto are falling outside, and my sinuses are making it so that the idea of my head exploding is becoming a positive thought.

For such a day, I thought this poem may serve as an apt complement.

The Poet's Obligation

Pablo Neruda

To whoever is not listening to the sea

this Friday morning, to whoever is cooped up

in house or office, factory or woman

or street or mine or dry prison cell,

to him I come, and without speaking or looking

I arrive and open the door of his prison,

and a vibration starts up, vague and insistent,

a long rumble of thunder adds itself

to the weight of the planet and the foam,

the groaning rivers of ocean rise,

the star vibrates quickly in its corona

and the sea beats, dies, and goes on beating.

So. Drawn on by my destiny,

I ceaselessly must listen to and keep

the sea's lamenting in my consciousness,

I must feel the crash of the hard water

and gather it up in a perpetual cup

so that, wherever those in prison may be,

wherever they suffer the sentence of the autumn,

I may be present with an errant wave,

I may move in and out of the windows

and hearing me, eyes may lift themselves,

asking, "How can I reach the sea?"

And I will pass to them, saying nothing,

the starry echoes of the wave,

a breaking up of foam and quicksand,

a rustling of salt withdrawing itself,

the gray cry of sea birds on the coast.

So, through me, freedom and the sea

will call in answer to the shrouded heart.

(translated from Spanish by Alastair Reid)