Richard


Richard C. Monnier
love letter

June 7, 1961


6/7/61 1 AM - 2:30 AM
My Dearest Mary,

It is about one o'clock Wednesday morning; and I and Miss Austen have just parted company.

Don't expect much of this letter; it will say as little as any other I've written, and likely not as much. As you well know, I have a unique way of saying nothing through an extensive and complex use of our mother tongue; or at least I'm sure I say far less than George; but epistlic prose has never been one of my strong points (saving the possibility of my having some, a statement of which there is little evidence to support the fact).

The purpose of this letter is vague. It may truly be the writing of an idiot, full of little sound and no fury, signifying, perhaps, a little more than nothing. Words, words, idle words, I never know how to put them to proper use.

But if they have any use for me at all it is simply to say that I love you. I know no other way than to say it simply. My scientific nature somehow doesn't lend itself to analyze this; or rather, I won't let it. Whether I say: "I love you., Ego amo te., or Ich liebe dich.", it is all the same. The origins of my emotions lie a thousand miles from the places where my mind has been; and these two, often and long respected parts of me have all too little in common. My love asks no explanation of me, only understanding, and as fortune would have it I'm not certain that i can do either. I seem to have the tenasity to try to explain and the capacity to understand; and yet I fail in both.

You must realize that, in spite of the apparent lack of meaning, all that I say means a great deal, at least to me; and I could tell these things only to one whose heart I felt very close to my own. My defenses, the qualities embedded in what you called reserve or restraint, are much too sharp to let words like these pass lightly. I'm more in love with you than any thing else that exists and most of that which doesn't; and I'm more in love with you now than I ever have been before, for love, of whatever kind, is an organic thing - it grows or it does. The rates of these things may change, but the qualitative analysis is constant.

I'll not worry about your understanding these things, for I doubt that they're understandable. They only express that (whatever these words may mean) I love you with allmy heart. And since it has its origin and center in that turbid chamber, there I'll let it liek transendent of my mind.

With a small simile of self mockery I close,

I give you, as I ever shall, my fondest --

Love,
Richie









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