Birth from the Depths of Stone

A poem by Pablo Neruda

Art: Voices from the Stone by Luz de los Andes

Music: Stones of the Ancestors by Andean Echo Collective

Arise to birth with me, my brother. Give me your hand out of the depths sown by your sorrows. You will not return from these stone fastnesses. You will not emerge from subterranean time. Your rasping voice will not come back, nor your pierced eyes rise from their sockets. Look at me from the depths of the earth, tiller of fields, weaver, reticent shepherd, groom of totemic guanacos, mason high on your treacherous scaffolding, iceman of Andean tears, jeweler with crushed fingers, farmer anxious among his seedlings, potter wasted among his clays— bring to the cup of this new life your ancient buried sorrows. Show me your blood and your furrow; say to me: here I was scourged because a gem was dull or because the earth failed to give up in time its tithe of corn or stone. Point out to me the rock on which you stumbled, the wood they used to crucify your body. Strike the old flints to kindle ancient lamps, light up the whips glued to your wounds throughout the centuries and light the axes gleaming with your blood. I come to speak for your dead mouths. Throughout the earth let dead lips congregate, out of the depths spin this long night to me as if I rode at anchor here with you.

Watch this PoeMusArt — a multimedia experience combining poetry, music, and art. Discover more at PoeMusArt.com.