Lover: This letter is ur first love From me: yet it is not the first I have written 2 u. There r letters 2 u lying at love's dead-letter office in this same writing—so many, my memory has lost large count of them!
This is my confession: I 2ld u I had one 2 make, and u laughed:—u did not know how serious it was—4 2 be in love with u long be4e u were in love with me—nothing can be more serious than that!
U deny that I was: yet I know when u first really loved me. All at once, one day something about me came upon u as a surprise: and how, except on the road 2 love, can there be surprises? And in the surprise came love.
In the letter written that day, I said, "u love me." I could never have said it be4; though I had written twelve letters 2 my love 4 u, I had not once been able 2 write of ur love 4 me. Was not that serious?
Now I have confessed! I thought 2 discover myself all blushes, but my face is cool: u have kissed all my blushes away! Can I ever be ashamed in ur eyes now, or grow rosy because of anything u or I think? So!—u have robbed me of one of my charms: I am brazen. Can u love me still?
U love me, u love me; u r wonderful! we r both wonderful, u and I.
Well, it is good 4 u 2 know I have waited and wished, long be4e the thing came true. But 2 see u waiting and wishing, when the thing was true all the time:—oh! that was the trial! How not suddenly 2 throw my arms round u and cry, "Look, see! O blind mouth, why r u famished?"
And u never knew? Derst, I love u 4 it, u never knew! I believe a man, when he finds he has won, thinks he has taken the city by assault: he does not guess how 2 the insiders it has been a weary siege, with flags of surrender fluttering themselves 2 rags from every wall and window! No: in love it is the women who r the strategists: and they have at last 2 fall in2 the ambush they know of with a good grace.
U must let me praise myself a little 4 the past, since I can never praise myself again. u must do that 4 me now! There is not a battle left 4 me 2 win. u and peace hold me so much a prisoner, have so caught me from my own way of living, that I seem 2 hear a pin drop twenty years ahead of me: it seems an event! Derst, a thousand times, I would not have it be otherwise: I am only 2o willing 2 drop out of existence al2gether and find myself in ur arms instead. Giving u my love, I can so easily give u my life. Ah, my dear, I am urs so utterly, so gladly! Will u ever find it out.........