濟(jì)慈詩(shī)歌和書信選(英文版)To Charles Brown, 30th September 1820. The ‘Mar
To Charles Brown, 30th September 1820. The ‘Maria Crowther’, off Yarmouth, Isle of Wight
My dear Brown;
The time has not yet come for a pleasant letter from me. I have delayed writing to you from time to time because I felt how impossible it was to enliven you with one heartening hope of my recovery; this morning in bed the matter struck me in a different manner; I thought I would write “while I was in some liking’ or I might become too ill to write at all and then if the desire to have written should become strong it would be a great affliction to me. I have many more letters to write and I bless my stars that I have begun, for time seems to press, --this may be my best opportunity. We are in a calm and I am easy enough this morning. If my spirits seem too low you may in some degree impute it to our having been at sea a fortnight without making any way.
I wish to write on subjects that will not agitate me much—there is one I must mention and have done with it. Even if my body would recover of itself, this would prevent it—The very thing which I want to live most for will be a great occasion of my death. I cannot help it. Who can help it? Were I in health it would make me ill, and how can I bear it in my state? I dare say you will be able to guess on what subject I am harping—you know what was my greatest pain during the first part of my illness at your house. I wish for death every day and night to deliver me from these pains, and then I wish death away, for death would destroy even those pains which are better than nothing. Land and Sea, weakness and decline are great separators, but death is the great divorcer for ever. When the pang of this thought has passed through my mind, I may say the bitterness of death is passed. I often wish for you that you might flatter me with the best. I think without my mentioning it for my sake you would be a friend to Miss Brawne when I am dead. You think she has many faults –but, for my sake, think she has not one—if there is any thing you can do for her by word or deed I know you will do it. I am in a state at present in which woman merely as woman can have no more power over me than stocks and stones, and yet the difference of my sensations with respect to Miss Brawne and my sister is amazing. The one seems to absorb the other to a degree incredible. I seldom think of my brother and sister in America. The thought of leaving Miss Brawne is beyond every thing horrible—the sense of darkness coming over me—I eternally see her figure eternally vanishing. Some of the phrases she we in the habit of using during my last nursing at Wentworth place ring in my ears—Is there another life? Shall I awake and find all this a dream? There must be we cannot be created for this sort of suffering. The receiving of this letter is to be one of yours—I will say nothing about our friendship or rather yours to me more than that as you deserve to escape you will never be so unhappy as I am. I should think of—you in my last moments. I shall endeavour to write to Miss Brawne if possible today. A sudden stop to my lie in the middle of one of these letterswould be no bad thing for it keeps one in a sort of fever awhile. Through fatigued with a letter longer than any I have written for a long while it would be better to go on for ever than awake to a sense of contrary winds. We expect to put into Portland roads tonight. The Captain the Crew and the Passengers are all illtempered and weary. I shall write to Dilke. I feel as if I was closing my last letter to you—My dear Brown.
Your affectionate friend
John Keats
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