by Damyanti Ghosh

Created on: February 19, 2008

It is recognized as the mark of a great poet to pick up a personal preoccupation and make it a part of universal thought, and Pablo Neruda has done this in a lot of his poems. "Fear" is no exception to this, and in it as the poet vocalizes his own concerns about death and lack of reflection, each reader is able to identify an inevitable human condition in the lines.

Everyone is after me to jump through hoops
whoop it up, play football,
rush about, even go swimming and flying.
Fair enough.

When Neruda says, "Everyone is after me to jump through hoops/ whoop it up, play football,
rush about,/" the busy din and excitement of normal everyday healthy life is invoked, where man rushes on from one thing to another without pause. Also important is the introduction of the phrase that is repeated in the poem " Everyone is after me": it is human nature to push the blame on others; people fondly imagine that it is not they themselves that are so preoccupied with the external world, but that others are forcing them to it.

Everyone is after me to take it easy.
They all make doctors' appointments for me,
eyeing me in that quizzical way.
What is going on?

When health fails, it is again the involvement of the people around one that concerns one the most: "Everyone is after me to take it easy./ They all make doctors' appointments for me, eyeing me in that quizzical way." The attitude of people around a seriously ill person begins to change, the "quizzical" looks are part of an effort to deal with the nearby prospect of mortality.

Everyone is after me to take a trip,
to come in, to leave, not to travel,
to die and, alternatively, not to die.
It does not matter

Everyone is spotting oddnesses
in my innards, suddenly shocked
by radio-awful diagrams.
I do not agree

When confronted by evidence of an illness, one goes into denial: "Everyone is spotting oddnesses/ in my innards, suddenly shocked/ by radio-awful diagrams.I do not agree". Neruda correctly diagnoses the human weakness of not wanting to face facts, and most importantly, not wanting to face the transient nature of existence and the cold touch of death.

Everyone is picking at my poetry
with their relentless knives and forks,
trying, no doubt, to find a fly.
I am afraid.

The same weakness of not knowing and acknowledging the truth about human existence, plagues people when things are not going so well professionally: " Everyone is picking at my poetry/ with their relentless knives and forks,/ trying, no doubt, to find a fly./ I am afraid." This confession

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