The Voice Of The Sea Speaks To

I Dance With People I Despise; Amuse Myself With Men Whose Only Talent Lies In Their Feet, Gain The Disapprobation Of People I Honor And Respect; Return Home At Day Break With My Brain In A State Which Was Never Intended For It; And Arise In The Middle Of The Next Day Feeling Infinitely More, In Spirit And Flesh Like A Liliputian, Than A Woman With Body And Soul. Entry (when She Was Eighteen) In Her Commonplace Book, 1868-1869.

She Was Moved By A Kind Of Commiseration... A Pity For That Colorless Existence Which Never Uplifted Its Possessor Beyond The Region Of Blind Contentment, In Which No Moment Of Anguish Ever Visited Her Soul, In Which She Would Never Have The Taste Of Life's Delirium.

There Was A Dull Pang Of Regret Because It Was Not The Kiss Of Love Which Had Inflamed Her, Because It Was Not Love Which Had Held This Cup Of Life To Her Lips.

But The Beginning Of Things, Of A World Especially, Is Necessarily Vague, Chaotic, And Exceedingly Disturbing. How Few Of Us Ever Emerge From Such Beginning! How Many Souls Perish In Its Tumult! The Voice Of The Sea Is Seductive; Never Ceasing, Whispering, Clamoring, Murmuring, Inviting The Soul To Wander For A Spell In Abysses Of Solitude; To Lose Itself In Mazes Of Inward Contemplation. The Voice Of The Sea Speaks To The Soul. The Touch Of The Sea Is Sensuous, Enfolding The Body In Its Soft, Close Embrace.

She Missed Him The Days When Some Pretext Served To Take Him Away From Her, Just As One Misses The Sun On A Cloudy Day Without Having Thought Much About The Sun When It Was Shining.