We were walking in that street again. All was full of mist and golden leaves. There was so much silence between us and the way seemed endless. It looked like a dream, and perhaps this is what everything is. Perhaps truth and freedom are way beyond all this, in the world of awakening. Yet I had no eyes for the shadow, I just walked. We had been friends all life, but life is a transitory abode, it seems, and life is short. At least ours had been, young as we were. There is no such thing as being young. You suddenly become aware of time. That evening, at any rate, I looked at my friend who had been, I am sure, my best, and I felt in myself, as clearly as a bright sky, that something divine and beautiful was coming to an end. He suddenly stopped, and I knew what he would ask. The question had been haunting me and all people in my life for a long time:
"Won't you marry Emma?"
It was a strange request in the middle of mist. We had all played together, once, in the same street, and become what we were. The problem of words is that they are far away from the things they name. To think what we were would be a wretched pursuit. I could say friends, or brothers, or lovers. We were all and none of it -- apart from the fact that he was, indeed, Emma's brother. The solution would have easy to conceive: We should have been created as a threefold light, as souls joined together in happiness beyond any form, for form is accident. We should have been, from the very beginning, the formless shape, the only place where love is true. As it was, we were but three individuals encumbered with the weight of forms and all conventions that it entails. Existence is an act of violence. We are victims of arbitrary contingency, and here is why: As if we were not yet friends, or brothers, or simply light, Emma fell in love with me. It must have been the greatest, the most beautiful love, for I knew the heart behind it. Did I not love her? There is much confusion between loving and being in love. Why, It seemed to me that love is formless. Being in love is concrete: The enthusiasm, the desire, the passion becomes visible, and all that is concrete and all that is visible is limited. It is constantly revealing the violence of forms.
As we continued walking in the mist, I could barely distinguish Michael's face between the coat and the hat. It was another person. Nobody would believe that once, on a better day, his face was the sun. But it is true that night always follows. That day in the garden, at least, would never end. He suddenly touched my hand, for the sake of some jest, and a warmth of unknown expression seized my breast. I sighed. I took my hand away. It was my first encounter with all that is concrete, and I was sure I would soon forget it. I did not.
Although I was walking close to Michael, in some ways Michael no longer existed. Was it just a phantom I was seeing, like in the dream of the garden? There was a scene that often visited me. My friend and I, we laid on a bed of daisies hugging each other. There was no word in the garden. We looked into each other's eyes as if something impossible had united us. I stroke his hair, I remember. There was no feeling of touch, and yet there was bliss and a welcome blindness. That garden was too small for a dream. This certitude I repeated to myself whenever I saw it with a sober mind. But what am I saying? Being in love is a kind of drunkenness. It would have been different if love had been loyal to what is true, if my affection for Michael had been always tranquil as friendship is. Why is it that I should have longed to be near his breath? What was there that only his body could give me? Intoxication overcame perception. A beautiful body, a temple of youth and health should be contemplated from the distance, with the eyes an of ancient sage who beholds and loves and goes his way. I had a strong desire to touch that body. I had longed for being touched again, even if only for the sake of a jest. I longed in vain. His hand should not rest over mine again. Unguarded innocence is bound to suffer.
But then, there was Emma. Oh Emma, I wish we could fly together beyond the stars. It began, I think, while you were playing. You applied yourself so deeply to music. Wherever you played, you fascinated the spirits, you recreated the world. Existence was suddenly full of purpose. Was it possible not to love your music? More than once, I found myself sitting by your side and declared my love to all that is noble and beautiful. You opened a door to me and I entered. I was gladly carried away by the nocturnes you performed. I allowed myself, alas, to bring so much confusion into your mind. Like the day when Michael took my hand and I thought I discovered bliss, you looked into my eyes while I praised you as if it were your body, your very hands that I loved. My praise was a praise of music. That was the quintessential soul with which I longed, with heavy eyes, to merge. What an unjust intimacy I was imposing on you. We charmed each other with pain. You gave me your music, which is neither yours nor mine, and I gave in return my loving looks and sighs. They were not for you, not even for Michael. And yet, the more you taught me the love of music, the more you betrayed my love and the very love you taught. Suddenly, I saw the longing of your eyes, and they were not longing for music. They were drunken of me. They were drunken of all that you believed to see in me. What am I, Emma? I am nothing.
If I had known beforehand that I would ever share a room with Michael, I would have stayed home. Suddenly, we were alone. I was talking to him and listening. It was overwhelming. I was expecting a window sill to light a candle and watch the rain in silence. I ask for your forgiveness, Michael, if in my naivety and ignorance I was not able to love your soul as it deserves. It was the first time we had a frank talk about your struggle in life, and oh, what youthful and wonderful struggles they were. That evening, I was returning to our room and I wrote this short note: "Walking in the woods. / It got dark. / I saw the trees and the huge shadows leading to a bluish darkness. / A star was shining. / And I listened to the world. / In myself. / Yes, I came all the way of darkness longing for music and things that only music can express / And I came listening to Schumann all the way long." Then I mentioned my evening melancholy to you, and you just nodded.
Later that night, I woke up and the moon was shining before me. Had I been alone, I would have stood up and gone out to be somewhat closer to bitterness. I have always been aware of the impermanence of things and their gentle sadness. I spent too many nights listening to Emma's playing and contemplating endlessness. Whenever the moon crosses my window I wake up, but that night felt like a prison. There you lay, sleeping so sweetly, and I did not know how deep your sleep was -- I stayed in bed in order not to wake you up, and yet unable to sleep, my face travelling throughout the sky with the moon and the moon on my face.
