Ode to Sadness by Pablo Neruda

Have you felt alone and isolated far away from the sentiment of happiness? I am certain that most of us have. And this poem,  Ode to Sadness, talks about that repulsive sadness no one desires to feel. I chose this poem because I like how Pablo Neruda describes sadness as a horrific and repugnant feeling. Within the poem, he demands it to go away and warns that he will destroy it if it attempts to draw near him. In the same way, I liked this poem because it shows the constant fight people have against feeling sad, alone, and unfortunate.

This poem uses many metaphors, personifications, and visual imagery. As we all know sadness is an abstract feeling and it does not have any sort of life qualities. On the first two lines we can observe these literary devices:

“Sadness, scarab
with seven crippled feet,…”

The descriptions “scarab” and “seven crippled feet” are some personifications given to sadness throughout the poem. I think that these descriptions are used to demonstrate how fatal and ugly sadness could be in people's lives. Equally, they evoke images in our mind. Well, I think that this poem is a great way to demonstrate how we should despise sadness in real life and never let ourselves get defeated by it, just a poet full of inspiration and strong poetic spirit; just as Pablo Neruda did.

Going for Water

                                                 Going for Water

   THE well was dry beside the door,

    And so we went with pail and can

    Across the fields behind the house

    To seek the brook if still it ran;

    Not loth to have excuse to go,

    Because the autumn eve was fair

    (Though chill), because the fields were ours,

    And by the brook our woods were there.

    We ran as if to meet the moon

    That slowly dawned behind the trees,

    The barren boughs without the leaves,

    Without the birds, without the breeze.

    But once within the wood, we paused

    Like gnomes that hid us from the moon,

    Ready to run to hiding new

    With laughter when she found us soon.

    Each laid on other a staying hand

    To listen ere we dared to look,

    And in the hush we joined to make

    We heard, we knew we heard the brook.

    A note as from a single place,

    A slender tinkling fall that made

    Now drops that floated on the pool

    Like pearls, and now a silver blade.

From the thirty one poems by Robert Frost, I decided to choose this one because it is charged of visual imagery. It uses other literary devices such as auditory imagery, metaphors, a hyperbole, figure of speech, etc. However, what mesmerized me were the vivid images this poem creates in the reader mind. Some examples of visual imagery would be on this part of the poem:

                                              “We ran as if to meet the moon

                                               That slowly dawned behind the trees,

                                               The barren boughs without the leaves,

                                               Without the birds, without the breeze.”

I can clearly imagine two young people running excitedly very early in the morning through the bared and quiet woods in search of a brook. I like how the author uses and describes nature within the story, specially the brook. On the last line where it says, “Like pearls, and now a silver blade,” I can visualize a long and shiny silver silhouette of a brook. Similarly, what I liked about this poem is how the author teaches us how to appreciate the beauty of nature and how we can turn simple and ordinary things into extraordinary things, just like the two young people who enjoyed going for water at the brook making it an unique moment.