Here I came to the very edge where nothing at all needs saying...and every day on the balcony of the sea wings open fire is born and everything is blue again like morning.

Pinochet had denied permission to transform Neruda's funeral into a public event. Three days after being hospitalised Neruda died of heart failure; however there are doubts as to whether or not the junta had a hand in his death. Neruda became known as a poet while still a teenager.