A libation is an offering of liquid, such as wine, milk, water, honey, or spirits, poured onto earth, stone, fire, or an altar. The action creates a visible exchange between the living world and what is honored beyond it. In poetry, a libation can be tender or grave: tea poured for the dead, rain offered to roots, whiskey spilled at a crossroads. It gives ritual a physical generosity and makes memory feel like something that can be fed.

A libation is a liquid offering, often wine, water, milk, oil, or another drink poured onto the earth or before an altar. The gesture can honor ancestors, deities, the dead, or a place. Poets may use libation imagery to explore generosity, memory, grief, reciprocity, and the act of giving something away.