This week’s poem is Pierre-Jean Jouve’s To Himself.

Pierre-Jean Jouve

To Himself (A soi-même)

Write now for the sky

Write for the arc of the sky

And may no black lead letter

Veil your literature

Write for the scent and the breeze

Write for the silvery leaves

May no human ugliness

Find sight consciousness breath.

Write for the god and the fire

Write for love of place, desire

That nothing of Man’s contained

In the void chilled by a flame.