MARINA TSVETAEVA
209
qualities existent in the nonexistent, the tender, stern adolescent face
which at this moment I read backwards: into life.
* * *
That's all Rainer. What about
your
death?
On this I'll tell you (tell myself) that it never existed in my life,
because, Rainer, in spite of Savoye, L' Auberge des Trois Rois, etc.,
you never existed in my life. There was: it will be, it has
remained .-Ob
ich an die Savoye glaub? Ja, wie an Himmelreich, nicht
minder, doch nicht anders .
You surely remember this.
I'll also tell you that not for one moment have I felt you to be
dead-and myself alive. (Not for one moment have I felt you:
momentarily.)
If
you are dead-I too am dead; if I am alive-you
too are alive-isn't it all the same what we call it?
But I'll tell you one more thing, Rainer-not only did you not
exist in my life-you didn't exist in life at all. Yes, Rainer, despite
you
and
life:
you-books, you-countries, despite you-the local
emptiness at all points of the globe, despite your universal absence,
half the map empty of you-you were never in life.
There was-and this is, from my lips, the greatest
titre de
noblesse
(I'm not speaking to you but to everyone)-a specter, that is,
the greatest indulgence the soul grants the eyes (our craving for the
real). An enduring, uninterrupted, patient specter, who gave us, the
living, life and blood. We wanted to see you-we did. We wanted
your books-you wrote them. We wanted you-you were. He,
I,
another, all of us, the whole earth, our whole troubled time, to
which you were indispensable. "In Rilke's time.... "
A clairvoyant? No. You yourself were spirit. We were the clair–
voyants .
If
you had walked into my room a year ago, my heart
would have stood as still as if you walked
In
now-more,
really-now, less than a year ago, because that sort of entrance
would be . . . more natural.
Three walls , ceiling and floor
Everything's ready
Now-Appear!
I wrote this to you last summer. Wasn't it really on everyone's
behalf? We conjured you up on earth with our will, that is, with all
the tragic lack of it, all our will-lessness, with all our prayers about
all
your will, we conjured you up on earth, and held you there-for a
time.
You were the will and conscience of your time, despite Edison,
