Dear You

Someone’s in the bushes...

September 12, 1963
 
Dear you,
 
I’m sure I saw something fishy, something odd. Something that didn’t sit easily on my shoulders, something like a weight pressing. There, you see it, there! Someone’s in the bushes. Look! There’s a tail. And there—a pair of eyes! Are they playing hide and go seek, Japan’s mega fauna?
 
100, 99, 98, 97, 96… ready or not, I’m coming to find you.
 
Yours in pursuit,
X

In awe of the natural world I know so little about...

Dear you,
 
The Malayan tapir, it must be noted, is stronger than initially thought to be. Here, Mt. Fuji prepares to be moved for the summer to Kampuchea. I think that was the general idea, or was it the other way round? What with this head cold, I could well have my facts in contrary ordering. All the same—can you imagine?
 
Yours in awe of the natural world I know so little about,
X
 
[Severe head cold perhaps reason for geographic muddle.]

Bonne nuit, my sweet...

Dear you,
 
A weakness of mine perhaps that is so. Playing with the things that don’t belong to me. Turning a boat round to point North when earlier it was bound South. I never knew, never dreamed it was your pleasure too. To nudge the scene for own humour, to master, to engineer a little grand confusion!
 
Yours in all tamed wickedness,
X
 
Bonne nuit, my sweet.

Such simple silliness...

Dear you,
 
It was in Russia that I saw a Western brush wallaby of grotesque proportions playing with those coloured tops in the square. Sent them spinning, then switched them about, putting green ones where previous there had been red. Such simple silliness, it made me happy to see such a thing.
 
Yours in repeated rotation and good humour once more,
X

I recall what it is like to feel a giant...

Stored in my breast pocket and posted to you from Poland.
 
Dear you,
 
Darkness is a good cloak and here in Jersey, I can lick theatrical wounds and build self up from past failure. (Bright, less shadow—soon.) Moving about unseen in those first hours of new day, when most are tucked in bed, I recall what it is like to feel a giant. In the harbour I play with the strings of the boats, tying them in new formations to their mast.
 
Yours in mischievous self re-emerging,
X