By An Image We Hold On To

On The First Of May, With My Comrades Of The Catechism Class, I Laid Lilac, Chamomile And Rose Before The Altar Of The Virgin, And Returned Full Of Pride To Show My Blessed Posy. My Mother Laughed Her Irreverent Laugh And, Looking At My Bunch Of Flowers, Which Was Bringing The May-bug Into The Sitting-room Right Under The Lamp, She Said: Do You Suppose It Wasn't Already Blessed Before?

I Believe There Are More Urgent And Honorable Occupations Than The Incomparable Waste Of Time We Call Suffering.

A Pretty Little Collection Of Weaknesses And A Terror Of Spiders Are Our Indispensable Stock-in-trade With The Men...

- And How Time Flies! What, Has It Already Been Twenty Years, Already Forty Years That We Are Together? Why, How Terrible! We Haven't Yet Said All We Wanted To Say To Each Other... May We Have A Little Respite, Or Else May We Be Allowed To Begin All Over Again!

It's So Curious: One Can Resist Tears And 'behave' Very Well In The Hardest Hours Of Grief. But Then Someone Makes You A Friendly Sign Behind A Window, Or One Notices That A Flower That Was In Bud Only Yesterday Has Suddenly Blossomed, Or A Letter Slips From A Drawer... And Everything Collapses.