Quote of the Day/Month: Pablo Neruda

Gadzooks! Blogger has just changed the way we do blogging, perhaps my friends who left blogging for gardening, raising pet snakes and watching every episode of "Welcome Back Kotter" had the right idea.

Today, we are continuing to quote famous poets from around the world in honor of National Poetry Month with a quip from the late Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) who was honored earlier this month at the Nazim Hikmet Poetry Festival in Cary (Raleigh), NC.

Neruda began life as  a poet when he was just a teenager. He was known for his surrealist nature. Neruda died just three days after right-wing dictator Augusto Pinochet (1915-2006) took power in the coup that would haunt Chile for decades. Neruda was from the political left.

Here is his quote:

"Loe is so short, forgetting is so long."

His famous works include "I Do Not Love You Except Because I Love You" and "If You Forget Me."http://www.poemhunter.org

Just for the fun of it, I am saying that I am blogging from the Salt Lake City Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, I have not been to that zip code since 2007.

Quote of the Day/Week-Nazim Hikmet

It turns out that we have had visitors today from Afghanistan?! Of course, we have no idea if those blog hits are from American troops or village dwellers in Kandahar province, but either way_ thanks for visiting.

Today, in honor of both National Poetry Month and the up-coming Nazim Hikmet Poetry Festival in Cary (Raleigh), NC, on April 15th, we quote the great Turkish poet Nazim Hikmet (1901-1963).

The great irony of Hikmet's life is that he lived in exile in her later years in Russia because he was a communist. He ended up dying in Moscow, but today he is the national poet of Turkey and his once-revoked Turkish citizenship was given back to him posthumously.

This year's Nazim Hikmet festival honors the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda.

Here is the quote from Hikmet, who is also my personal favorite poet, with Charles Bukowski being a close second:

"However and wherever we are, we must live as if we will never die."