Forbidden Poetry? (CC)

So far I have been split on whether or not I enjoy our poetry unit. On one hand, the imagery in poems are amazing and I especially love the text breaks that occur. I can't explain it, but when the text breaks so suddenly and drastically, it just really gets to me. On the counter point though, I really am not that into poetry. I can't always figure out why the author chose to break the text there or what kind of figure of speech they used. However, when looking through poems to do for my poetry project, I came across a rather enjoyable and unique poem; "If You Forget Me" by Pablo Neruda.

Link:http://www.poemhunter.com/best-poems/pablo-neruda/if-you-forget-me/

Unfortunately, I was denied this poem on the grounds that it may have been translated and so some words may have had different meanings. The good news is that this poem wasn't my first choice, but instead my second choice. Even though I ended up getting my first choice, I was still a little annoyed at the fact that I wouldn't have been able to do this poem even if I wanted to. Well, I decided to do a little analysis on this poem because 1. It's a great poem that deserves to be analyzed and 2. because I really want to do it because it was denied. I'm basically following the whole "tell someone not to do something and all they want to do is that" cliche, but I don't care.

So the summary is very simple and for the lazy people out there, I'll give you the highlights. A guy is proclaiming to a girl that he is in love with her and wants to be with her, but he also gives her a warning. If she begins to become disinterested, he will begin to become disinterested in her and then leave her if she forgets him. He also says that if she will love him, he will treat her greatly and love her for the rest of his days.

What I found intriguing about this poem is the way it goes from a love poem to a threat seamlessly.  It starts by saying that he deeply cares for this girl, but also retaliates saying he will leave her if she forgets him, begging the question of whether he truly cares for her. Is it actual love or is he trying to scare her so that he can control the relationship? Something about the whole idea just really gets to me and its what prompted me to consider it for the project. Oh well.