The speaker in Pablo Neruda’s “Sonnet 73” from Cien Sonetas de Amor (100 Love Sonnets) dramatizes the theme of lust preceding love. The sonnet form employed by Neruda is the American, or innovative, sonnet.
(Neruda’s sonnet features no rime scheme or regular rhythm pattern in the Spanish; therefore, I did not impose them in my English translation of it.)
First Quatrain: “You will perhaps recall that pointed man”
Looking back in time, the speaker is addressing his lover, reminding her that in the early stages of their relationship they tried to guard their hearts again falling in love. He suggests to her that she might remember how suddenly his lust was aroused; calling his male member “that pointed man,” he reminds her how it “slipped out of the darkness” ready for penetration.
He then credits that organ with knowledge that the two lovers did not yet understand: that they would actually fall in love; that the sex act was not just for sex alone. Unlike the two lovers, however, the man’s sexual organ “detected smoke” and knew that lust would motivate the two to come together.
Second Quatrain: “The pale woman with long black hair”
The speaker then turns his attention to the woman, actually the woman’s female counterpart, which “surfaced like a fish from the deep.” Their initial satisfaction of lust caused them to “erect against love / A machine armed and fanged.” Even though they were unable to rein in their sexual desires, they were unwilling to commit to a love relationship.
They, therefore, built an elaborate system of shields against the possibility of falling in love. The speaker calls their system a machine that resembles a weapon with teeth. Those tender feelings that begin with falling in love are to be chewed up and spit out, so that the two remain unaffected by the grasp of true love. The speaker implies that their affection should remain a romantic adventure but not progress to the status of love.
First Tercet: “The man and woman hacked through mountains and gardens”
In the first tercet, the speaker takes his lover back to all the traipsing around that they did while they were trying to keep love out of their relationship: they visited mountains, gardens, rivers, and walls, but between them, they kept the defensive “weaponry” against love.
Second Tercet: “At last, love recognized itself as love”
But finally, love won. They had to call love by its proper name, “love.” The speaker reminds his lover that finally when he saw her name, he had to admit that he could see that her heart was beating for him and that after he knew that she truly loved him, he finally had admit that he loved her.
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