VERLAINE Paul (1844-1896).

VERLAINE Paul (1844-1896).
POEM autograph signed "Paul Verlaine", To Édouard Rod| 1 page and a quarter in-8.
Beautiful poem from Invectives.
Intended for the collection Invectives, published by Léon Vanier in 1896, this poem of 6 quatrains (no. VII in the collection, numbered in blue pencil on the manuscript) attacks the Swiss writer and literary critic Edmond ROD (1857-1910). The manuscript shows a few erasures and corrections.
"Comme on baise une femme sur les cheveux,
On the eyes, the neck, the breasts, and everywhere,
In the wrong direction, of course! I want to
To caress this Swiss and this fool, from end to end.
He's a writer as we are in Switzerland,
He's a teacher like a pawn. [...]
This Rod, who is not the son of old Herod, [...]
Called me, a beginner in his exodus,
A good writer, but a horrible scoundrel...
But I hardly recognize the right of this scoundrel
To appreciate my worst and my best [...].
And damn in the end (and better) for his morals
Which are nothing but a pallid heap of hypocrisies!
In all freedom, even to the immoral
Liberty, libertas to the poets!"