Del océano al verso. Las caracolas de Pablo Neruda

some shapes, as the verses he wrote about this group clearly show: "And I had a cypraea whose spots fell / on its cape, embroidering its pure velvet / with burned rings of gunpowder or panther". The same happens in other verses of the poem "Gongorine Mollusca", included later in this book. It’s also remarkable the number of Polymita specimens, endemic to the island of Cuba, whose beautiful shells show an astonishing range of colors. These shells were gifted by Carlos de la Torre, a distinguished Cuban malacologist whose friendship is described by the poet in his memoirs. Regarding the pieces obtained in Chile, it’s noteworthy that there are several species very common in the shores of the central coast and Eastern Island. Generally, these are small specimens: some correspond to their juvenile forms, others belong to species quite familiar to Chileans (such as abalone and scallop), while there are others of larger size, eroded, broken, not very appealing, probably collected by the poet himself during his frequent strolls in the beach of Isla Negra. Their particular appearance makes me think it’s unlikely that they were gifts. Did he pick up everything he found? Did he admire even the most humble little shells? It seems that the poet respected even those that weren’t big or beautiful, after all they also reflected life. While observing their sizes, one can distinguish many shells or fragments, big and small, but most of them are very little and of scarce economic value. There are few pieces of commercial value corresponding to giant specimens, since they are not found in the biosphere; or hard-to-find species, be it because of their unusual presence in nature, because they live at great depths, or because they 30 universidad de chile