Poem 3: Keeping Quiet

1. What will ‘counting up to twelve and keeping still’ help us to achieve?

Counting up to twelve and keeping still will help us to understand ourselves and
to introspect. We will be able to realize the real impact of our selfish actions on
each and, finally, on the entire humanity.

2. Do you think the poet advocates total inactivity and death?

The poet does not advocate ‘total inactivity’ because he has a firm belief in life.
He wants everyone to live a complete life, full of peace and contentment. He
wants everyone to take a break from the hectic schedule and introspect for a
while to improve the quality of life.

3. What is the ‘sadness’ the poet refers to in the poem?

The poet refers to the sadness which all human beings experience because of the
lifestyle of nonstop work, stress, aggression and destruction. This sadness comes
because man does not understand himself.

4. What symbol from nature does the poet invoke that there can be life under
apparent stillness?

The poet uses ‘Earth’ as a symbol to invoke that there can be life after apparent
stillness. The Earth seems ‘still’ from outside but is alive and vibrant deep within.
Similarly, our silence can help us to maintain a harmonious life in Earth and stop
destruction.

Summary

In the poem ‘Keeping Quiet’, Pablo Neruda talks about the need for introspection
and to create a feeling of mutual understanding, love and respect in the human
world. He speaks about life where human beings are engrossed in their selfish
motives and are living a life full of strife and destruction.
The poet asks everyone in the world to keep still for twelve seconds to create
togetherness. He wants all the people on the earth, not to talk in any language
but to maintain a silence to communicate with other’s heart. He believes that this
sudden moment of silence will be an exotic moment. There will be no noise and
no movement. The fishermen in the sea will stop killing the whales and the men
who gather salt will stop their work and look after hurt hands. This kind of break
will enable both nature and man to embalm their wounds. Due to this break,
human beings will start looking and caring for themselves rather than their work.
Moreover, those who are fighting with each other will stop and walk about with
their fellow brethren.

Pablo Neruda clarifies that he does not want to advocate total inactivity or death.
He is concerned that we all are running blindly in a rat race and, in this process,
we have completely missed our true goal to keep a balance between man and
nature. There is great sadness in human beings for, they do not understand
themselves. A huge silence will break this sadness. We should learn from nature.
When everything comes alive in nature after a period of seeming death, it is
equivalent to this silence. After this death, there comes life. This is a dangerous
situation and can bring catastrophic results. So our survival in this world depends
upon our ability to understand and rectify this. This can be done only when we
introspect and develop a feeling of understanding with each other.