A closed letter to Ivan

A vast black sleep
falls over my life
sleep, all hope
sleep, all desire.

I say this quatrain of Verlain to myself, I walk as the hunted in premonition of new losses, I pound my head in premonition of a new solitude and I think of you, Ivan, of you, little brother, who went astray from me on our wanderings. How clearly I see! How misty-eyed I’ve become! The future of an embittered, unrecognized, unpublished writer awaits me; a gradual drying up awaits me, which I fear and from which I will flee, I promise you that. And you – stay with me a while longer!
I am in Kutná Hora; this morning I received a letter from Jarka informing me that Kamil, Zdenek and Bonek are definitively breaking away from me, and that he is the only one who believes in me (this is about some long-ago matter concerning Kamil, his Věra and me), yesterday I finished writing the novel Malá víra (Little Faith) and one more small poem; I’m going to Prague, I’m still going there and don’t think I’m only writing you because I’m alone. I’m writing you because I like you.

Jiří, 4 Feb. 39