On my school notebooks 
On my desk and on the trees 
On the sands of snow 
I write your name 

On the pages I have read 
On all the white pages 
Stone, blood, paper or ash 
I write your name 

On the images of gold 
On the weapons of the warriors 
On the crown of the king 
I write your name 

On the jungle and the desert 
On the nest and on the brier 
On the echo of my childhood 
I write your name 

On all my scarves of blue 
On the moist sunlit swamps 
On the living lake of moonlight 
I write your name 

On the fields, on the horizon 
On the birds’ wings 
And on the mill of shadows 
I write your name 

On each whiff of daybreak 
On the sea, on the boats 
On the demented mountaintop 
I write your name 

On the froth of the cloud 
On the sweat of the storm 
On the dense rain and the flat 
I write your name 

On the flickering figures 
On the bells of colors 
On the natural truth 
I write your name 

On the high paths 
On the deployed routes 
On the crowd-thronged square 
I write your name 

On the lamp which is lit 
On the lamp which isn’t 
On my reunited thoughts 
I write your name 

On a fruit cut in two 
Of my mirror and my chamber 
On my bed, an empty shell 
I write your name 

On my dog, greathearted and greedy 
On his pricked-up ears 
On his blundering paws 
I write your name 

On the latch of my door 
On those familiar objects 
On the torrents of a good fire 
I write your name 

On the harmony of the flesh 
On the faces of my friends 
On each outstretched hand 
I write your name 

On the window of surprises 
On a pair of expectant lips 
In a state far deeper than silence 
I write your name 

On my crumbled hiding-places 
On my sunken lighthouses 
On my walls and my ennui 
I write your name 

On abstraction without desire 
On naked solitude 
On the marches of death 
I write your name 

And for the want of a word 
I renew my life 
For I was born to know you 
To name you 

Liberty. 

Paul Eluard