Durand’s French and Haitian references attest then to the dual nature of his writing as hereconciles the established French tradition of poetry with a committed choice to write for Haiti.
This does not mean, however, that his project is without contentions. Despite the joyful
expressions about the contribution his poetry makes to literature, Durand predicts with some
degree of accuracy that decades of personal and national poetry will ultimately be forgotten. In
the “Sonnet-Préface,” the fleeting beauty of the sunset, like his poetry, will inevitably fade; the
colors of the evening sky will give way to a shadow of oblivion. These two tercets conclude the
sonnet:
Ainsi les humbles vers de cet humble volume
Où l’inspiration, pour un moment, allume
Un reflet fugitif aux ardentes couleurs,S’éclipseront demain. L’oubli, cette nuit sombre,
Sur les vers du poète étendra sa grande ombre
Et nul ne parlera de ses Rires et Pleurs. (9-14)The word “humble” repeated twice in the first verse is frequently used by Durand todescribe his own poetry as unassuming and unimportant. This humility with which Durand
portrays his own collection in these introductory texts also functions as a topos, but the question
remains as to why Durand chose to contextualize his work in this way. Other books of poetry for
example begin by claiming their own insignificance and paying tribute to a much great writer.
Baudelaire, at the beginning of his 1857 Les fleurs du mal offers his “fleurs maladives” to the
“poète impeccable,” and “parfait magicien des lettres françaises,” Théophile Gautier.^193 José-
Maria Heredia dedicates the collection Les Trophées “ tel qu’il est” to Leconte de Lisle in 1893
and says to his mentor “...mon titre le plus sûr à quelque gloire sera d’avoir été votre élève bien
(^193) Charles Baudelaire, Les fleurs du mal (Montreal: Variétés, 1944) 1.