52 Poems: Weeks 47 and 48 Pablo Neruda on Keeping Quiet

With the year winding down and headlines reminding me of all that is wrong in the world, I need a poet to remind me to keep quiet. 

Footsteps

after Pablo Neruda’s “Keeping Quiet”

Now that you are walking

I can hear your footsteps

Pitter patter in the world.

I want to keep quiet,

to silence the noise of the world,

the shots fired on a winter morning,

the distant blast of bombs exploding

at the end of a marathon.

I watch you bravely take first steps

into this world 
of peace and violence,

truth and lies,
and remember to count
to twelve, and keep still.

Keeping Quiet

by Pablo Neruda

Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth,
let's not speak in any language;
let's stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment
without rush, without engines;
we would all be together
in a sudden strangeness.

Fisherman in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victories with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about;
I want no truck with death.

If we were not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.
 
Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.