Em—
     I don’t want to see you anymore. There’s a lot else that can be said about this decision of mine, but I don’t want to go into it. So that’s it then. Don’t come by. And I won’t be coming up there again. Much love, Newt
 

Em—
     I think we need a nice long rest from each other. You’re aware yourself that things haven’t been going well with us for a while. Thing that most elicited my decision was that I just didn’t like the way you set the relationship for us. The “week” together this summer. On a “beach.” Perhaps you have to act like this. What you are, want to become, your history. But it’s now too much for me. I won’t be coming up. I don’t want you coming by. I want no communication between us of any kind. I can’t say “Maybe some other time perhaps.” I just don’t feel like that. I’m sorry. Love, Newt

Dear Em:
     I won’t be coming to Stonehill anymore. I don’t want you to come to my flat again. I just don’t want to go on with our relationship anymore. It’s not going to change: the relationship or my decision. At least it doesn’t seem so to me. Most of all, I’m tired of you setting our pace. That “week” in the summer. On a “beach.” It’s usually your way. It’s a shame you can’t just let things happen between us without always analyzing it, trying to control it, putting me to tests, being worried that everything will pass you by and too many things will never be tried out by you if you stay only with one mate.

     I do think about you sweetly. Fooling around. Holding you close. Talking. All that. But the other disturbing things that have happened between us, if they’re not already embedded in my head, just don’t creep in anymore, they rush.

     I don’t feel responsible for this break. For a little, all right. But it does seem it has to go the way you want it, without any give and take, and I find I can’t exist in an atmosphere like that. Especially when it’s coupled with your repeatedly turning me on and off and I think your serious remarks about how you look forward to the day when you’ll be able to manage two and maybe three successful love affairs at one time, so I just don’t want to see you anymore.

     I don’t say that what you’re proposing for yourself is impossible or wrong. Maybe I am “rigid,” “superannuated,” as you said—whatever, but it just isn’t my way. And I do love you very much, but for the first time in my life that doesn’t seem to be enough to make me want to stay. So, cheers then—En

Dear Mary—
     I won’t be coming to Stonehill anymore. I don’t want you to come by my place. I just don’t want to go on with our relationship anymore. I’m tired of you always setting the pace. The “week” this summer. On a “beach.” And I don’t think it’s because I’m “indecisive” or don’t like to make “any decision” that this is the case. You take over because you want to, have to, whatever’s the force. If you tell me once more it’s partly astrological, I’ll have to yell at you again “That’s asinine.”

     I went along like a “dud” because I don’t like to direct a relationship based on love. It’s a pity you can’t let it happen without dashing it to dust every time it goes well. We’ve gone on for hours about the reasons for all that: the history. But to me there really aren’t any explanations.

     I also can’t get the bad things out of my head. I think about you sweetly. Fooling around. Joking. Holding you close. Talking. Walking. Working. All that. But the other disturbing things just don’t creep in, they rush. And a lot else about what’s happened between us just hasn’t been etched out of my head yet. Your turning me on and off. Blowing me up. Indifferently letting me go. Separating “for the time being” because you thought it was the “wrong time for us” or it was just “bad timing when we met” and soon after that your returning and for a while staying and being open and loving and then re-going when you thought it was the wrong time for us again or just thought that for yourself it was best. I always felt when you returned “Well that’s the last time for that, folks,” but it never was. Now I think “How in hell could I have thought any of those times after the first few times could have been the last time?” And after the last time I suppose I was just holding on. Like a kite. No, a kite doesn’t hold on, it’s held, and I was held, though not tight like a kite. Oh, I was held tight like a kite sometimes, but we’re talking about my holding, not being held. Maybe the kite holds on to a tree. But you’re no tree, though you do have roots. But so do turnips, teeth and attributes that lead to actions and decisions, but as you can see I’m the worst at analogues, metaphors and similes. Yes, you can so be a tree. But no, I wasn’t a kite that way except maybe in my becoming entangled in you and not being able to fly freely or sail away or something because of the string. But a kite becomes entangled around something, not in it, except if it maybe got blown into a window or cave. But even there it would probably only get entangled around a table or chair in the window or a rock in the cave, and not entangled around the window or cave it got blown in. Anyway, now I’m letting go.
 I don’t feel responsible for causing this break. Or, maybe a little. But I’m not going to rationalize it away by saying, as you hinted the last time we drove in, that what we both probably have wanted for the last few weeks is for the relationship to quietly and unemotionally end. Maybe that’s the way you want it, but I really don’t care. I don’t care anymore what you want or what you’ll do. Honestly, I’m saying that what we had eventually went the way you wanted it, without any compromising on your part or give and take, and I couldn’t tolerate it, so I just don’t want to see you anymore.

     I still love you, but for the first time in my life the existence or reality or whatever it could be called concerning this love for you just doesn’t seem to be enough to make me want to stay. I’m sorry. I hate writing letters like this, like less to get them, but there’s no other way I see to express what I must say, short of calling you, and I don’t have a phone, it’s a trudge through slush and snowdrifts to reach a booth, and you know I’m even more uncommunicative, befuddling and in the end agonizingly battological when I try speaking on one. So, best ever then—Newt

Dear Em—
     I won’t be coming to Stonehill anymore...