Calligraphy by Raoul

From Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada, 1924, by Pablo Neruda.

Published in 1924, this collection of poems, Neruda’s first and most well-known, made a name for him. It created a stir because of its eroticism, all the more surprising given that Neruda was only 19 at the time.

Translation of the first 4 lines by Michael R. Burch. Translation of the remaining lines by me:

Every day you play with Infinity’s rays.
Exquisite visitor, you arrive with the flowers and the water!
You are vastly more than this immaculate head I clasp lovingly
like a cornucopia, every day, with ecstatic hands. You’ve looked like no one since I’ve loved you.
Let me lay you among yellow garlands.
Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the southern stars? Ah, let me remember you as you were then, when you did not yet exist.