-on this Friday morning-

to set-up his poem: "The Poet's Obligation,"

Neruda writes:

“To whoever is not listening to the sea

this Friday morning..”

so I stretched my skinny arm as far

as bone could allow to the air above my head,

waving the palm of my hand like a frantic schoolboy

who thought he knew the answer, straining from

the depth of my throat, all in seeking the great poet's

recognition.— well, it seemed that way.

so this Friday morning finds my head with its ear toward the sea,

my feet approaching the storm-fences holding fast in the last stand

against the wind, and from my hometown where ran an ocean of cloth,

recalling my baptism when the Chilean whispered something, asking:

“What is water like in the stars?

and I thought to myself:

who in this world would ask such a question?