Absent Musings

So there I am... searching for a book to read and upon not finding anything to spark my interest I decide to pluck out one of my favourite novels by Anne Rice. Between my hardcover copies of Pandora and Taltos however happened to be a small book I missed in my search and as I drew Pandora out, it fell to my feet.

The ever-curious creature, I bend over to pick it up. A small black book. No title, no author. All-black or rose-framed pages on the inside. I begin to look through it, a tiny thing of only 28 pages, and discover it is filled with a collection of love letters. Of course upon finding this the first thing I do is sit down, put my smoke away, and become completely engrossed in these letters. To say these short glimpses into people’s intimate lives were fascinating would be an understatement.

From this book I chose a few letters to share with you who happen to read my absent musings, and before I reveal these tidbits to you I pose these questions:
-What happened to the great era of romance?
-What happened to the vulnerability of putting your heart and soul on a piece of paper and handing it out?
-Why can we no longer listen to the breathings of our hearts?

As a final note, I wish to dedicate the sincerity of this blog post to a friend I made not long ago but whose patience and kindness has forever earned her a place in my heart. May you, my dearest friend, find the strength to speak your heart's desires, because time flows by quickly and we lose ourselves in the motions and in our hopes that they will notice our love for them. Speak, for they in fact do not.

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Cruel stony hearted wretch, snatcher of bread from a starving child, how had you the heart?
How could you? Do you know what I means to me?
I want my plaything that I am to throw away.
I want my Virgin Mother enthroned in heaven.
I want my Italian peasant woman…
I want my rapscallionly fellow vagabond.
I want my dark lady. I want my angel –
I want my tempter.
I want my Freia with her apples.
I want the lighter of my seven lamps of beauty, honour, laughter, music, love, life, and immortality…
I want my inspiration, my folly, my happiness, my divinity, my madness, my selfishness, my final sanity and sanctification, my transfiguration, my purification, my light across the sea, my palm across the desrt, my garden of lovely flowers, my million nameless joys, my day’s wage, my night’s dream, my darling, and my star…
O cruel, cruel, cruel, cruel, have you no heart at all?

George Bernard Shaw – Beatrice Campbell
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… and remember, each moment I am robbed of you, each night and all nights I am turned away from you, turned out by you, give me pangs
The exquisiteness of which must be measured by the knowledge that they are moments and nights
Lost
Lost
Lost
Forever.

Jack London – Charmian Kitteridge (That’s a woman btw)
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But do you know what it is to wait five months for a kiss?
Do you know what a poor heart endures, that for five months has felt, day by day, hour by four, life abandon it, the cold of the tomb descend slowly in the solitude, death and oblivion falling drop by drop like snow?

Alfred de Musset – Aurore Dudevant (Pen name George Sand)
_________________

I was at your house tonight. They showed me some pictures of you taken in your high school class room and track team.
The one I liked best was the one where you and another fellow were ready to start running.
I looked at you, and this is what went through my mind.
That hair cropped close, but still it curled around my finger as if it were grasping it. I’ve kissed those lips. That expression I’ve seen so often. I’ve held those wrists with my fingers. My hands have been n those hands. My fingers have touched those sides and both touched lightly and dug into these shoulders.
My lips have kissed that throat.
And I know you had to be alive because you’re so alive! Do you know what I mean? Come to me in a dream tonight and tell me that you’re alive and safe. Please! I know you want to tell me. Maybe somewhere in a prison camp tonight you’re saying to yourself that tonight you’re going to try to tell me that you’re alive. If there’s anything good in the world, they’ll let you tell me.
Now to sleep, and to wait for your message.
Myra.

Myra S Strachner – Bernie Staller. March 18 195 (one day after the letter was written) Bernie was killed in action.