Rene Daumal's "Le Contre-Ciel" is a collection of poems about death, not a death that ends life but a death that begins it. For this early 20th century French poet-philosopher, "Life," in its most dynamic sense, can only be experienced after the facade of self identity has been systematically negated through a kind of metaphysical suicide. In "Le Contre-Ciel," Daumal invites us, his readers, to go through this process of regeneration-through-negation with him in order to revive in ourselves a knowledge and understanding of our primordial sources."