Marina Tsvetaeva, Her Life in Poems - Rolf Gross

Moscow. I don't want to write about that. I can only say that on the day of
my departure (and you know what I left for), at the end of a brief stay in
Moscow during which I looked at everything "for the last time" Marina
shared her time between me and someone else whom she now laughingly
calls a fool and a rascal.
She blamed the death of Irina (Alya's sister) on my own sisters
(something she sincerely believes) and I only recently found out the truth
and re-established contact with L. and V. [Lilya and Vera]. But
that's enough. Enough of today. What can I do This cohabitation cannot
go on for long. Or it will be the end of me. M. is deeper than Asya. In
personal life it's a sheer destructive impulse. All this time I have been
attempting to avoid being harsh and yet to prepare both Marina and
myself for the coming separation. But how can I do that when Marina is
trying with all her might to do the opposite She is convinced that she has
now sacrificed her own happiness in order to forge mine. She expects to be
able to satisfy me by attempting to preserve the outward appearance of
living together. If you only knew how difficult and confused it all is. This
sense of burdensome weight doesn't leave me for one second. Everything
around me is poisoned. I don't feel one strong desire, just complete and
utter pain. The loss that has hit me is all the more terrible because during
recent years -- as you have witnessed -- it has been mainly the thought of
Marina that has kept me alive.
I loved her so strongly, and straightforwardly, and unshakeably, that I
was afraid of nothing except her death. M. has become so inseparable a part
of me that now, as I try to separate our paths, I feel a sense of such
devastation, such inner laceration, that I try to live with my eyes halfclosed.
The complexity of the position is still further exaggerated by one of
my most fundamental characteristics. With me, ever since childhood, the
feeling "I can't do otherwise" has always been stronger than the feeling
"This is what I want". The static prevailing over the dynamic. Now all
my sense of the static has gone to hell. And it was my only strength. As a
result -- complete helplessness.
I await the coming days and months with horror. "The pull of the
earth" is pulling me down. I am trying with all my strength to scramble
out. But how and where
If you were here, I know you would be able to help M. a great deal. I
hardly ever talk with her about the main thing. She has grown blind to me
and to what I say. Or maybe it's something to do with me, nothing to do
with blindness at all. But that can wait for another time.
I'm writing this letter to you alone. No one yet knows anything. (Or
perhaps everyone knows.)
The letter is undated, but a postscript, dated 22 Jan 1924, includes the passage:
"I have been carrying this letter around for a month. Today I've made up my
mind. Marina and I are continuing to live together.She has calmed down. And I have
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