Heidegger - The Primacy of Poetry

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What must be thought farthest in advance in meditative thinking is both the essence of poetry and the preparedness for the plight of poetry, since the machinational supremacy of 'reality' can be broken only by the necessary sovereignty of poetry.  Yet this poetry must be of an essence that accords with the history of beyng, inasmuch as the poetry states disclosively the moment of the decision in favor of beyng as appropriation of the enduring.

The historical human being of the Western future must be allowed to acquire one thing as what is first: to dwell on this earth poetically, i.e., to build, for the grounding of the truth of beyng, measure and structure in humanity - in order to experience an essential plight, the assignment to being in its question-worthiness.




M. Heidegger, Uberlegungen XIII, 1939-1941.



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