Explore "A Small Animal" by Pablo Neruda on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
A small animal, pig, bird, or dog, defenseless, gristled with feathers or fur,
I heard it all night, fevered, howling.
It was a vast night and in Isla Negra, the sea, all of its thunder, its floating hardware, its tons of salt, its glass broken against the immobile rock, the sea shuddered.
The silence was clear and fierce after every bolt or shower.
My sleep was stitched by the spinning of the interrupted night and then the small, shaggy being, small bear or sick child, suffered asphyxia or fever, little bonfire of sadness, a cry against the immense night of the ocean, against the black tower of silence, wounded animal, so small, barely whispering beneath the emptiness of night, alone.