Dante / Neruda 4 -Poetry Came for Me -Poems of Pablo Neruda
"Sometimes a piece of sun burned like a coin between my hands.
I remembered you with my soul clenched in that sadness of mine that you know."
Dante / Neruda 3 - Poetry Came for Me - The Poems of Pablo Neruda (A Discussion) : The students read these poems cold - which is a great thing to do every once in a while (like when we read poetry before each novel). Perhaps - that's because the first time that I was exposed to Neruda - it was unplanned and it was an aural experience (at the film Il Postino). We read the poems as a class - asking for volunteers - and after each poem - and sometimes after each stanza - we talk about what they mean and we talk about how the move us. We are able to do seven of his poems - and sometimes a song about Pablo Neruda by Patty Larkin. In our mix, there are love poems, political poems, poems about masculinity, poems about finding one's calling. They are all beautiful. I was blessed when I taught to have at least one fluent Spanish-Speaking student in each class. That meant we were also able to listen to a few of these poems in their native tongue. Though it didn't seem possible that there could be more beauty - we were then able to find it.
Lesson Overview
Reading the Poems
There is no quiz today - and the poems are read cold by the students (though I usually very greedily read one of them). The procedure for the lesson is to make sure everyone has their handout - and of course - pens in hand. Then a student volunteer reads a poem aloud. If the poem is long - I may ask a number of students - having each one read a stanza. When we do it that way - I will often stop after each stanza and discuss that just read stanza with the students. As always, I ask that the students - while the poem is being read - listen carefully - follow along and write down anything that occurs to them.
In the Remote Enhancement section you can find a Power Point with the poems on it - breaking some of them down and it includes the biographical material. I only used this the year we were in Remote Learning - the handout gave more than enough focus (though I did use the Power Point for the first poem, "Poetry" to get the ball rolling).
The Poems
Below, I will give one or two important points for each poem - but for my full notes (if you can read my handwriting) you may also find my complete notes (added to each year we did this lesson). There is a biographical blurb as well on the first page of the handout which I most often skipped for two reasons - First, there is no time - and I would always rather do poetry than history. Second, the students will get a chance to meet Pablo Neruda in film when we watch Il Postino.
"Poetry" - A poem about the poet finding himself. Students are ALWAYS wowed by that opening line "And it was at that age.....Poetry arrived in search of me." They will be even more impressed when they see it again at the end of Il Postino. There is a Power Point below that I used the last few years that I taught Neruda - that breaks this poems down for discussion.
"House" - A poem about origins and fairly enigmatic - I love to see what the students make of it. I break it down - what do we know? What can these metaphors mean? Why a house? Why made of stone?
"The Poet" - a very different poem, though on the same theme, as the first one (and also linked to the origins poem, #2). What did poetry give him? What did Poetry allow him to see? How did it complete him?
"We Have Lost Even" - my favorite Pablo Neruda poem - and one of my favorite writings, period. I ask the students to indulge me - and to let me read it aloud. Its beautiful imagery - its sadness - its quiet jealously speaks volumes. We tackle it line by line - metaphor by metaphor.
"And How Long?" On the handout is both the original Spanish and the English translation of this beautiful poem. We start by asking one of my Spanish speaking students to read it aloud. If I have more than one fluent Spanish speaker - I will break it up by stanzas. I tell the students in the class to just listen - perhaps closing their eyes. If you don't have any Spanish speaking students in your class - there are recordings available in Spanish that you can play for your students. They should hear at least one read that way - it is pure music!
Then we read it in English - again with many student volunteers. Sometimes its best just to pick a row and have each student in turn take a stanza. Because of its length - I usually just ask students to pick out something they wrote down while we listened - and we talk about that. I do, though, bring up Candide - and our lesson on The Search - and that always looking for something and going to others to find answers.
"Walking Around". We repeat the Spanish then English process for this poem as well. Again, I ask the students what they made of it - and we concentrate our discussion on that. But, because these lines will appear again in Il Postino - we go over the first two stanzas regardless. How does a barbershop make one cry? How can you be tired of being a man?
"La United Fruit Co." This is a political poem - and that's important because so much of Neruda's poetry and his activism was related to politics - and in fact, he died fighting for what he believed in.
"Pablo Neruda" by Patty Larkin. A lovely song with the lyrics on the last page of the handout. If we have time, I would play it - if not I would play the song as the students left the room after the bell rang.
Some Poems of Pablo Neruda - A Handout
This handout only exists as a PDF. Probably because it is so old and I xeroxed and pasted things together. In addition to the seven poems by Neruda, there is the song by Patty Larkin, and a brief biography of the poet. Two of the poems are printed in English and Spanish.
Poems of Pablo Neruda - with my notes
This version is kind of mess - sometimes I end up taking notes a new, fresh copy because I can't find the old one - and then I find it again. That means you will find two copies of some poems - with two sets of notes. Oh well - more to choose from I guess. Again, I hope you can read my handwriting. These notes are the basis of the class discussion that we have on the poems - see the Lesson Overview above.
For the last few years that I did this lesson - I created a Power Point that presents the first poem we do, "Poetry" - and breaks it down into beatifully digestable parts. We would use this AFTER a student(s) have read the poem aloud - to help understand it and to get into that poetry groove. There is also a Power Point with ALL of the poems and biographical material - see below in the Remote Enhancement section.
"Pablo Neruda" a song by Patty Larkin
A lovely song with the lyrics on the last page of the handout. If we have time, I would play it - if not I would play the song as the students left the room after the bell rang.
Remote Enhancements
Of course you can use this in a nonRemote classroom as well - however, I found that the handout in the in-person handout was more than good enough to keep things going. It has all the poems we do as well as the biographical material on Pablo Neruda.
I did do this remotely and it worked very well indeed. By now, the students are used to doing poems remotely - and this is, in fact, a little easier as they are not doing the usual breaking into groups first.
PoemsofPabloNeruda_20170126.m4aA Class Recording
We read some of the poetry of Pablo Neruda - we read the poems aloud (make sure you have a copy of the poems as you listen) and then discuss them after they are read. We tie much of what we did in Dante and earlier to the poems as well as what will come at the end of the period (to begin watching Il Postino).
Il Postino - Movie and Questions: And so we get to this wonderful film that ties the entire unit together (something that I strive for with all of my movie picks). There is Neruda, there is Dante - there are poems and metaphors. The sublime ending of the movie will be echoed in a project that the students will do as well (you can find the project at the end of the movie questions, but I am also planning on giving it a page of its own on this site).
Thoughts on the Lesson
In this lesson, I ask the students to indulge me and to let me read one of the Neruda poems. And I do mean indulge. For myself, I believe that all reading aloud is best done by the students - not the teacher. There are some poems and lines in texts - that I do read aloud - but only because they mean a lot to me, so it is indulgent. There is another reason of course - I want the students to see that love of the text and the possibilities therein.