21 Love Poetry Analysis

To what extent does the presence of nature impact the poems in “twenty love poems and a song of despair”

Within “twenty love poems and a song of despair” written by poet Pablo Neruda, nature seems to be used as a device to put across the meaning of the poems to the audience through conventions such as metaphors, personification, pathetic fallacy and man y others that will be discussed below. The use of nature as a big theme throughout the poems can be linked back to Neruda’s life. It is widely known that Neruda travelled to many countries for various reasons and whilst there, he enjoyed visiting many of the locations that were nature based including the sea, the mountains and the fields. References to these as devices can be seen throughout the poems.
A poem that includes very heavy natural imagery is “A song of Despair”. Within this poem, Neruda seems to use nature as a mechanism to convey his anguish and misery. This poem includes natural imagery from the beginning. This can be seen in the quote “The river mingles its stubborn lament with the sea” (line 2). The river and the sea can be seen being personified in this line therefore allowing the readers to sympathise with the in-animate objects. The use of
The title itself refers to the lust of the narrator for his lover during the morning and this idea is then enforced within the first line with the quote “The morning is full of storm, in the heart of summer”. This line has a lot of natural imagery towards the biology of humans, especially males, within the morning. The use of “full of storm” portrays the strong need for sexual fulfilment and lust and this lust is seen as a very passionate act by using “heart of summer”. The use of the word “heart” emphasises this passion as the heart is considered the most important organ and so demonstrates how his passion (the “summer” in the sentence) is