10 Feb
10 Feb
10 February 1920
Love
[. . .] You see the war - the tragedy of the war was that ever since I knew you you had been trembling towards it. (This is a secret.) The war was no surprise to you: it was a supreme justification of all you had trembled towards (like a compass) all your life. Thats what nobody else can ever know. It wasn't the war that broke a bright, radiant, ardent, loving, rich spirit as all your friends and admirers think. You never wrote in pictures or other than in that austere fashion, and you were talking to Gordon about weariness of the spirit, ultimate obscenity, vultures, ‘our wounds' years & years before. But I always felt that behind all that talk - "I am very tired" a quoi bonisme there hid - what I cant help calling a bright burning angel - loving, turned to the light. Oh my child! But like some daisy - innocent as others are not - wise as others are not - dreaming, fulfilled, serene, a poet, the father of my children. Oh, my pride to think that!
But the war came - your dark self pulled over, and finally at the Casetta you said you did not even want the angel to triumph - and I knew we would never have children - wed never be Adam and Eve lying under a tree looking up through the branches with our own little flowery branch lying between us. My own, you are always so terrified that I want to intrude, to have you other than you are. You are always thinking theres a need of escaping from MY idea of you. You are wrong. I adore you as you are - your deepest self, but yes it is the ‘angel' I adore and believe in for ever.
Wig. [To J.M. Murry in Collected Letters]