THYRSIS:
I woke up this morning with the feeling that I did
not love you. That same thing has happened to
me two or three times, and I do not understand it.
It must be because at the present moment you do not
love me! You are writing your book, and telling
yourself that you cannot love me as you ought!
Is this so? It is only a surmise on my part, and
I do not know, but I should not be surprised if you
were. I only know that the one thing that can
bring us together is love, and I do not love you now.
Perhaps you can explain it to me. I write this
absolutely without emotion.
I tell you there have been things horribly wrong about
you. You have done anything but inspire love
in my heart—you have never seen me with
love in my heart. Until lately, I never have felt
any love for you; before, I simply compelled myself
to think I loved you, because my life seemed to depend
upon it. There have been many times when, as
I look back, you seem to me to have been base.
Well may you preach, while you are alone, and are
monarch of yourself. I shall have to have more
of a chance than has ever come to me, before I will
bear your displeasure or your exhortations. If
you come to me and speak to me of the high, proud self
that I must reach, every vestige of love for you will
leave my heart, and I would as soon marry a stone
pillar!
Great Heaven, what strange moods I have! I picture
our meeting each other, unmoved by love; you determined,
energetic, indifferent to all things, myself included;
and I disappointed, but with a hardness in my heart—no
tears!
I am indulging now in the most lifeless and gloomy
of broodings; if you do not come back to me, the only
soul I can love, if you are not joyful and strong,
sincere, sympathetic, and loving, all of these—I
shall know it is a farce for me to ever hope to gain
any life with you. I do not believe that
any woman can grow without love, and a great deal
of it. Why do you suppose I am writing all this—I,
who have felt such deep and true love for you?
I have no courage—the dampness of the day
has settled into my soul—and I shall be
joyless until there is no more cursed doubt of you
and your love for me.
Dear Corydon: Against resolutions, I am writing
to you again. I thought of you—there
is a boat up the lake to-day with some hunters, and
if I finish this letter, I can send it in by them as
they pass. I have many things to tell you, and
you must think about them.
This is one of my paralyzing letters. It will
reach you Monday. I can’t tell where I
may be then. I have been wrestling with the end
of the book, and I am wild with rage at my impotence.
The fact has come to me that no amount of will is
enough, because all my life is cowardly and false.
I have found myself wanting to sneak through this
work, and come home and enjoy myself; and you can’t
sneak with God, and that’s all. I cannot
come home beaten, and so here I am, still struggling—and
with snow on the ground, and the shack so cold that
I sit half in the fire-place.
