At first I was frightened, and fought against it as against something that might grow upon me. I reproached myself for disloyalty in thought. Ah! what need had I to fight? What need had I to choke down rebellious fancies, while my wife`s love was working that miracle that makes two spirits one?
What is it, this union that comes to us as a surprise, and remains for all outside an incommunicable mystery?
Unmarried love
What is this that makes our unmarried love seem so slight and childish a thing? You and I, who know it, know that it is no mere fruit of intimacy and usage, although its growth it keeps pace with these. We know that in some subtle way, it has been given to a man to see a woman`s soul as he sees his own, and to a woman to look into a man`s heart as if it were, indeed, licrs.
But the friend who sits at my table, seeing that my wife and I understand each other at a simple meeting of the eyes, makes no more of it than he does of the glance of intelligence which, with close friends, ulien takes the place of speech. He never dreams of the sweet delight with which we commune together in a language that he cannot underhand that he cannot hear a language that has no formulated words, I’eeling answering feeling.
It is not wonderful that I should wish to give expression to the gratitude with which I have seen my life made to blossom thus; my thankfulness for the love which has made me not only a happier, but, I humbly believe, a wiser and a better-minded man. But I know too well the hopelessness of trying to find words to describe what, were I a poet, my best song might but faintly, faintly echo.
I thought I heard a rustle behind me just now. In a little while my wife will come softly into the room, and softly up to where I am sitting, stepping silently across your bearskin rug, and will lay one hand softly on my left shoulder, while the other slips down this arm with which I write, until it falls and closes lightly, yet with loving firmness, on my hand that holds the pen.
And I shall say, “Only the last words to Will and his wife, dear.” And she will release my hand, and will lift her own, I think, to caress the patch of gray hair on my temple; it is a way she has, as though it were some pitiful scar, and she will say, “Give I hem my love, and tell them they must not fail us this Christmas. I want them to see how our Willy has grown.” And when she says “Our Willy,” the hand on my shoulder will instinctively close a little, clingingly; and she will bend her head, and put her face close to mine, and I shall turn and look into her eyes.
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