Until the tenebrous waves of the Pacific do cease, I will never stop loving thee.

For all the

promises woven by this mouth shall never trespass upon the unwritten law of unremitting truth
between lovers—no matter how far, no matter how near, no matter what clouds above pass, no
matter where the winds do lead us. But, in this case, let me repeat: My dear Cassandra, beautiful
Muse, betrothed princess, the lighthouse of this wandering soul, may you hear the repentance I
am about to offer you.
I understand with what apprehension you have for me, a poor, young soul such as I, to love you,
to offer my love to you, since you have, as you mentioned in our previous letters encountered
much untrustworthy men, much lies, numerous forms of betrayal. It is true that I do not claim to
be of greater virtue than those who came before me; perhaps I shall lie to you, perhaps I shall
betray you, perhaps the ruling passion shall conquer my heart still and lead me to desolate you in
this Purgatorial desert between loving and nunnery, a limbo whereby one finds herself trapped in
an endless conflict: between marriage and between offering oneself to God.
Nonetheless, you will forgive me for crossing these boundaries of yours and entering the
chambers where you hide in, because I feel as though you are withholding the beauty of heart,
because you fear being hurt by another. Insofar as love is concerned, my dear Cassandra, I
believe it is necessary to delineate between a fear fashioned by Fortune and fear fashioned by
ourselves. For the latter, we have developed such fears since they are dangerous to our physical
survival—that is, we cannot, inasmuch as we are still human beings with our symptomatic
weakness, egregiously engage in frantic battles with predators that roam the lands or with other
such dangerous animals, for they may harm, as I have said, our survival.
However, as for the latter, are they not only created by a design as such: an avoidance of life?
That these fears are largely constituted of those things which shall allow us either to live life
fruitfully or to suffer a great deal of loss in spirit and heart. In other words, the fears produced by
ourselves are those that deal with matters of living—the challenges besought us, and the risks
which come along with them. For instance, our situation right now. What then, dear Cassandra,
do I wish to impart to you in order to convince you?
I am not so self-indulgent as to believe myself worthy of convincing you, but perhaps offering
you another perspective would be my goal. That is, insofar as we would like to live life as human
beings, and not as impotent creatures (you will pardon the language)—we must, believe me, live
life dangerously. For it is in these rare challenges, with the constant accompaniment of these
risks, that drive us to greatness and those glimpses of a meaningful life, of something that is
worth holding onto. Of course they should also, conversely, bury us in Inferno if we are not
careful, but I believe that this is as much part of life as anything else.
What then? What I mean is that love is just as much suffering as it is pleasure. One must always
expect to be hurt in these manners which deal with something so dear, so precious, and so human
—namely, our souls. But I do not wish, as others did, to take this from you so forcefully, so
thanklessly, so heartlessly. I wish for that uncommon relationship to exist within us: that we, as
beings which emerged from this world, to border on one another, to accept ourselves as solitary
beings and edge on those solitude of ours.—