Please explain the metaphors used by Pablo Neruda in "If You Forget Me."

In Pablo Neruda's love poem, "If You Forget Me," the author uses
beautiful metaphors to attempt to tell his lover that he will forget her if she forgets him, at
the same instant this might happen. (Personally, the depth of his feelings in the poem do
not convince me that he could let her go as easily as he
claims.)

In the first stanza, the speaker compares all of the
everyday, mundane things in life as of essential importance because they all lead him to thoughts
of her: her very essence is in everything that surrounds him, as she
surround him. The ash from old fires, the wrinkled log waiting for the next fire; everything that
exists: aromas, light, metals, etc., are little ships that wend their way unavoidably back to
thoughts of her. (The elements of his life are compared to little ships that return to her: this
is your metaphor.)

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...near the fire

the
impalpable ash

or the wrinkled body of the
log,

everything carries me to you,

as
if everything that exists,

aromas, light,
metals,

were little boats

that
sail

toward those isles of yours that wait for
me.

Later in the poem, the speaker
compares her heart to a plant when he refers to his roots planted there, stating that if she
should leave him, he will pull those roots away and find another place to plant
them.

...[if] you
decide
to leave me at the shore
of the heart where I have roots,

remember
that on that day,
at that hour,
I shall lift
my arms
and my roots will set off
to seek another
land...

In the last stanza of this
wonderful love poem, the direction of the poem shifts as the speaker describes the kind of love
that awaits them if she remains with him. The man notes that if she (his
lover) will remain true to him, then he will never leave. The speaker uses
the images of fire for this final metaphor, comparing her love with his passion, and how the fire
of his love will feed off of the fire of her love:

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ah my love, ah my own,

in me
all that fire is repeated,

in me nothing is extinguished or
forgotten,

my love feeds on your love,
beloved