Henri to Yvette.

Warsaw, 3 July

Darling,

Since yesterday, terrible things are going inside me. I would never have the strength to write to you about them. At times, it seems as thought an immense pair of pliers is brutally tearing y body and at times extreme joy stifles my heart. Yvette, I know that it’s terrible, but I don’t know what it is. You are the cause. My dearest, dearest darling; isn’t that what I’ve already said to you. I say the same things now. Tomorrow too.

Yesterday, I received five letters from you sent on from Palestine. And a photo. They are all written in May. Now May was like that; you {obliterated by censor’s stamp} in the middle of nature in the Jura and I was on the green roads of Italy {obliterated} at the same time that I was at Venice, absolutely intermingled with you, that Venice and I were no longer anything but you, at the very same minute your soul also was with me. I read it in those letters. Dearest Yvette, my little one, isn’t it marvellous this immense tenderness that joined us together in the month of May.

In Venice you came to me and I re-lived in its debauchery of beauty, the fears of Quena.

Tell me can I speak? I am so very accustomed to love you in silence. There in Belmont in the month of May when there were only the Alps between us, tell me darling, did you love me then? Am I idiotic or have I become mad. Tell me darling, why is it that {obliterated by censors stamp} your love for me, in {oblit} letters. Do you love me? I would like (oblit {I have asked the questions and I feel so awkward, so embarrassed. I am afraid to do you harm. But I feel that you love me. Yvette, my little darling, you can see how I begin to stammer. I must stop this.

Excuse me these few words. If I hurt you, forgive me. Don’t take me too seriously. And don’t be afraid of doing me harm. I can put up with it. And nothing will change my heart, which, quite independently of all will, only beats in the rhythm of our life together. There are a heap of things that I want to say to you. About “Exile”, about your financial situation etc. But I can’t now. I keep it back {oblit. By censor’s stamp} calm. Now, you see, there is a storm. Afterwards there will be The Song to Nature, you well know the Pastorale.

The last letter that I wrote you from Italy: “Nothing will wipe out my love so endowed.” What are you doing in Vienna, Yvette?

Henry.

I have thought a long time about whether I should send you this letter, this wild cri. But the only alternative would be not to write at all. For even if I began a hundred other letters, the result would be the same. I know myself. So it’s all one. At least it’s short and that {obliterated by c.s}. But as a favour from friend to friend, darling, burn it straightaway.