CHAR (René). Autograph poem entitled "Loin de nos cendres" ("Far from our ashes"). 3/4 p. in-plano (38.5 x 28 cm), a few erasures and corrections, on Fabriano drawing paper; loosely mounted on cardboard, matted. Text written in 1981, originally published in the Nrf in 1983, and collected in the 1983 edition of the Œuvres complètes (Paris, Gallimard, Nrf, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade). "Our cake of chimeras having scorched at its sunset, the first watches of ["famous" strikethrough] rival time appeared to view. No more black limousine to carry us away on its infatuated slides. Destitution is possession. A fine nocturnal dust barely disturbed ["barely" crossed out then reinscribed] the down of your dear sleeping face. What came from the stars was not theatrical but observed. My shyness was reborn under careful ["royal" crossed out] exteriors, those that white frosts bestow on grasses at rest on the reverse side of icy plateaus. Common suffering, despite the sting of rarefied echoes, sang the hymn. The final ovation went not to a sepulchral half-light ["sepulchral" was added later], mirific glassmaker, but to a line ["of slim" corrected to "a line"] of eels in a hurry to leave the natal stream for the ["wide" crossed out] rivers with their uneven walls. There the alders gather. Sur le lit du courant passe le sang, le virtuose du retour [René Char had originally written: "Sur le lit du courant le sang, virtuose du retour"]..." Autograph letter to his companion Anne Favre-Reinbold. ILLUSTRATED FOLDER WITH TWO GOUACHES BY ALEXANDRE GASPERINE, one signed and dated "AG/81". The artist also illustrated two books by René Char, Les Voisinages de Van Gogh (1985), and Le Gisant mis en lumière (1987). Cover reproduction