A Dog Has Died is a poem by Pablo Neruda that can relate to any pet owners who have lost their dog. The poem is about losing love. It tells about how the author misses his dog after it died and when they buried it. He looks back on all of the good memories they had and realizes how much he will miss him. In the poem, he speaks as if he has lost the love of his life, his companion, and his best friend. He believes that the dog made him appreciate the little things in life and now that he is gone, he is left alone in the world. The dog gives the owner a sense of hope and optimism until it reaches the end of its life. The author no longer has the same happiness and excitement that he used to have. He lost the one thing that he shared …show more content…
Death was not explained as a thing of horror and grieving, but as a simple part of life that everyone must experience.
The repetition of the consonance sound device, -ed, emphasizes that the dog has passed. As in the lines: “He never rubbed up against my knee like other dogs obsessed with sex” (A Dog Has Died. Lines 24-25) It is a direct reference to the theme loss of love. He is showing that the dog is gone and that the author is looking back on the memories they shared when the dog was alive. He is mourning the loss of love he is having to face now that his best friend is gone.
Pablo Neruda uses a simile of comparing the love he has for his dog to the love of a porcupine. He writes “His friendship for me, like that of a porcupine,” which is a direct comparison to porcupine love (A Dog Has Died. Line 17). The love of a porcupine is like the bond he made with his dog in that he believes that love physically hurts. It physically hurts in porcupine love but it emotionally hurts with human love because humans have the ability to get attached. When something or someone close to us dies, there is a physical hurt and emotional pain caused by this