Mist . . .

I watched the football match after I woke: all the while feeling guilty about not writing. After the game, I ran my finger across the books on one of the bookshelves until said finger rested on The Complete Poems of Anna Ahkmatova.

I am a lucky man, for I have a library with lots of poetry in it. I'll spend a good part of the day reading Anna even though she will, most likely, make me cry.

I cannot write. Somedays, just knowing it makes me feel good.

Some Anna:

Latest Return

I have one path:
From the window to the door and back.
Song

Day followed day--this and that
Seemed to go on
As usual--but through it all
Loneliness was permeating.
It smelled a little of tobacco,
Of Mice, of an open chest,
And it enveloped everything in poison
Mist . . .

July 25, 1944
Leningrad