Explore "Chilean Lapwing" by Pablo Neruda on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Belonopterus chilensis
The lapwing flew off flashing white snow and black snow and opened its suit in broad daylight, in broad morning silver: its nuptial wings' fan was priceless: precious the body adorned by the morning and the plumage.
The velvety bird's wild extravagance shone upon the stones of Isla Negra and I thought: where is it going?
What celestial reception?
What golden water wedding?
What salon of pure purple among columns of hyacinths, where only the well-dressed clouds may accompany it?
Well, I said, perhaps it's going to crown the tresses of Pedro Espinosa's friend, the naiad of the River Genil.
The diviner did no such thing: it planed down to land among clumps of stubble in a fallow wheat field, and there it launched its language, its piercing tero tero, while it pecked, picked, and dispassionately devoured a simple earthworm.