Poetry of Revolution: Romanticism and National Projects

As Williams explains it, a poet’s project will also be a spiritual endeavor, and historical

figures are considered nearly synonymous with Haitian deities. Williams ends his preface with

an additional Latin quote: “I, pavre liber, sed non sine spe,” which translates as “Go little book,

but not without hope.” While Williams likely composed this himself, he modeled it on Latin

poets who would send their book off with a kind of blessing. Indeed what follows the preface is

a sonnet by Williams entitled “Le départ” in which wishes the poet of Poésies Nationales a

happy voyage guided by divine forces. Williams’ sign of confidence in Coicou’s project and

solidarity as a fellow Haitian poet is expressed in this final tercet:

O nef, trésor d’espoir, adieu! vogue et courage!

Et nous, nous qui t’aimons, nous tresserons pour toi

De verts lauriers. Pars! pars! Dieu guide ton voyage. (12-14)

4.2 THE POET AND THE MUSE

The first poem in Coicou’s collection is entitled “Introduction” and is preceded by two

epigraphs of its own. The first one is by the French Provençal poet and regional ethnologist

Frédéric Mistral (1830-1914) who also wrote in the late nineteenth century: “Ame de mon pays,

/De la Patrie âme pieuse, /Je t’appelle! Incarne-toi dans mes vers.” In Mistral’s untitled portion

of his long narrative poem Calandau, the last part of the verse actually reads “Incarne-toi dans

mes vers provençaux.”^262 Devoted to the revival of Provençal language and literature, Mistral

shared with Coicou a commitment to a threatened cultural identity. According to scholarship on

(^262) Frédéric Mistral, Œuvres poétiques complètes (Aix-en-Provence: Edicion Ramoun Berenguie, 1966). Emphasis
added.