Belated Poetry Thursday Poem and Update

I was flying to NYC last Thursday for another Mama Gena weekend, so I missed Poetry Thursday. I decided that I'd make up for it this Monday afternoon.


Ode To The Lemon
by Pablo Neruda

From blossoms
released
by the moonlight,
from an
aroma of exasperated
love,
steeped in fragrance,
yellowness
drifted from the lemon tree,
and from its plantarium
lemons descended to the earth.

Tender yield!
The coasts,
the markets glowed
with light, with
unrefined gold;
we opened
two halves
of a miracle,
congealed acid
trickled
from the hemispheres
of a star,
the most intense liqueur
of nature,
unique, vivid,
concentrated,
born of the cool, fresh
lemon,
of its fragrant house,
its acid, secret symmetry.

Knives
sliced a small
cathedral
in the lemon,
the concealed apse, opened,
revealed acid stained glass,
drops
oozed topaz,
altars,
cool architecture.

So, when you hold
the hemisphere
of a cut lemon
above your plate,
you spill
a universe of gold,
a
yellow goblet
of miracles,
a fragrant nipple
of the earth's breast,
a ray of light that was made fruit,
the minute fire of a planet.

Translated by M. S. Peden


So I'm back from another Mama Gena weekend. Woah! This one was emotional. What a roller coaster of laughter and joy and tears (the good, cathartic kind). I'm rather drained from the weekend and at the same time completely rejuvenated. I feel reborn. I wish for all women to share this ride. Hold on to your hats though... whew!