The Nature Of Love: A Spiritual Union?

As I write the course materials for the Diploma in Logotherapy & Existential Analysis, I am reflecting on love and its centrality to the human experience. We Logotherapists are cognisant of that and it is very much part of how we approach therapy.

We will be, amongst many other texts, exploring Pablo Neruda’s Sonnet XVII from 100 Love Sonnets (1959). It is a profoundly intimate, non-traditional, and thought-provoking love poem that rejects superficial romance for a deeper, almost spiritual union. It describes loving 'in secret, between the shadow and the soul,' emphasizing a love that is pure, direct, and selfless, where the both partners become one.

I have reproduced it here, without any further comment:

Sonnet XVII

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,

or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.

I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,

in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms

but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;

thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,

risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.

I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;

so I love you because I know no other way than this:

where I does not exist, nor you,

so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,

so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.