GIP!

New Lij icon, pic courtesy of undone27. *le sigh*

The words are from a Pablo Neruda poem that I translated a while back. Don't have my translation in front of me at the moment, but I'll edit to add it when I get home from work this evening.

Sweet Aphrodite, but he's lovely.

*sigh*

That LJ Meme thingy

Alright, alright, already. goldberry_b tagged me on this one.

1. Go into your livejournal archive.
2. Find your 23rd post.
3. Find your 5th sentence (or closest to it).
4. Post the text of your sentence in this post along with these instructions.
5. Tag 5 people on your friends list.


Okay, I had to look around for a post I could do this with, since most of 'em back then were little ones. This is the closest to the 23rd post I could find. Not a sentence but, as I say, closest I could get.

You ready? Got the brain bleach handy? You sure? OK, here goes. Don't say I didn't warn you...



Ashton Kutcher as Frodo Baggins



*covers her ears to drown out the screaming*

Warned you.


Now tagging: aratlithiel, mordelhin, princessofg, rubynye, and His Utter Magnificence, knittedmerry.

For Verses Thursday: I Like You When You're Quiet, by Pablo Neruda

I altered that Elijah icon I posted earlier today because I wasn't happy with the balance.

As promised, here's the poem that goes with it. The original title is Me Gustas Cuando Callas, and you can read it here. I did my translation of it in 1999, as part of Twenty Love Poems and a Desperate Song.


I Like You When You're Quiet
by Pablo Neruda


I like you when you're quiet because it's as if you were absent
and you hear me as from a distance, and my voice doesn't touch you.
It's as if your eyes had flown away
and as if a kiss had sealed your mouth.

Just as everything is full of my soul
you emerge from things, full of my soul.
Dream butterfly, you resemble my soul,
and you resemble the word melancholy.

I like you when you're quiet and you're as if far away.
And you seem to be complaining, cooing butterfly.
And you hear me as if from a distance, and my voice doesn't reach you.
Let me grow quiet alongside your silence.

Let me speak to you also with your silence
bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You're like the night, quiet and starstrewn.
Your silence is that of a star, just as distant and unadorned.

I like you when you're quiet because it's as if you were absent
Far away and sorrowing as if you had died.
Then just a word, just a smile is enough.
And I'm glad, so glad that it's not true.