Dreams young & old: Pablo Neruda poetry broadside
The story behind the original letterpress Pablo Neruda poetry broadside of the poem "No lo había mirado / I Had Not Seen It," translated by William O'Daly from Book of Twilight, Copper Canyon Press.
//
No lo había mirado
I had not seen it and our steps
sounded together.
I never heard its voice and my voice was
filling the world.
And it was a sunny day and my joy
didn't fit within me.
I felt the anguish of carrying the new
solitude of the dusk.
I felt it next to me, burning arms,
clean, bleeding, pure.
And my pain, in the black night,
entered its heart.
And we go together.
Pablo Neruda, tr. William O'Daly
//
Pablo Neruda wrote “No lo había mirado” as a very young poet. It's from his first book, Crepusculario (Book of Twilight), which he financed the publication of by selling everything he owned, including a family heirloom supposedly, at the age of 19. I was a young artist when I got the opportunity to print this poem for Copper Canyon Press. It was part of our trade for their help facilitating my acquisition of the Colt's Armory Press — a dream come true I still have to pinch myself over. So much beautiful and useful work bloomed from it.
Including this Neruda broadside, which was a limited edition that's long gone. It was never for sale nor publicly available as it was a special commission. I found a stack of seconds deep in my archive that I almost recycled in the recent shop move — I did do a lot of ruthless recycling! But I have a fondness for Pablo Neruda's poems, ever since I first read Veinte poems de amor y una canción desesperada (Twenty Love Poems and One Song of Despair) as a lonely high school exchange student in Ecuador. And I remembered the long nights struggling with the inking system on the new-to-me Colt's Armory, such a delicate beast of a press that I didn't know how to operate when I got it. I largely taught myself, which is why I ended up with so many seconds of the early projects I printed on it.
I feel this poem speaks from a young and an old place at the same time and I love how it holds the two together. Unapologetically. It reminds me how we are always ourselves, holding our pain and joy, our knowing and unknowing. I love how it ends, staunch and continuing. Speaks a lot to how I feel right now: so very in the middle of a career I never anticipated, years both shorter and longer, time taking me by surprise, a new season crisping around the corner. I don't know who the poem is speaking to and I can't quite picture the speaker, but I'm glad we get to go together.
You can get one of the seconds of No lo había mirado for $20 while they last. They'll come unpackaged, as-is, with ink and paper irregularities but still legible, hence useful!
About Pablo Neruda
Born Ricardo Eliezer Neftali Reyes y Basoalto in Chile, Pablo Neruda adopted his own pseudonym while only a teen and quickly became one of the most widely read poets in the Spanish language. In 1971 he won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Read more about Pablo Neruda on Poetry Foundation.
Credits
Subject line and intro text are from the poem "No lo había mirado / I Had Not Seen It" by Pablo Neruda, translated by William O'Daly from Book of Twilight, Copper Canyon Press, 2017. Used by permission.
Thanks to Copper Canyon Press for supporting my dream always, and for permission to make these seconds available.
