Incantation

Quick answer: What is Czesław Miłosz's poem “Incantation” about?

Written in Berkeley in 1968, “Incantation” is a hymn to human reason, which Miłosz calls beautiful and invincible: no bars, barbed wire, or pulping of books can defeat it. John reads it as a refusal to despair by a man who had seen up close what humans did to each other during World War II.

John shares Czesław Miłosz's 1968 poem “Incantation” and walks through it in plain terms. Miłosz opens with a claim that ought to come with a warranty: human reason is beautiful and invincible. You can lock a man up, string wire around him, pulp his books, and ship him out of the country, John writes, but the reason in him keeps working, like a pilot light that doesn't know how to go out. Reason writes Truth with a capital T and lie in lowercase. It holds the picture of how things ought to be, the way a carpenter's level shows a shelf is crooked whether he likes it or not. That's why Miłosz calls it the enemy of despair and the friend of hope. Then the poem gets strange, sending the news to the mountains by a unicorn and an echo. John says he isn't joking. Miłosz had seen what humans do to each other in World War II, and still refused to despair. That's the whole poem.

Why it matters for leaders: Leaders who have seen the worst and still choose hope give others a straight line to steer by.

Q: What image does John use for Miłosz's idea of reason?

A: A pilot light that doesn't know how to go out, and a carpenter's level that shows the shelf is crooked whether you like it or not.

Q: Why the unicorn and the echo?

A: Because the news they carry sounds impossible: that philosophy and poetry will outlast tyrants and torture.

Read the full essay on Substack → https://heroespath.substack.com/p/incantation

By John Fenzel, founder and CEO of Heroes' Path Foundation