I WANT her though, to take the same from me.
She touches me as if I were herself, her own.
She has not realized yet, that fearful thing, that
I am the other,
she thinks we are all of one piece.
It is painfully untrue.
I want her to touch me at last, ah, on the root and
quick of my darkness
and perish on me, as I have perished on her.
Then, we shall be two and distinct, we shall have
each our separate being.
And that will be pure existence, real liberty.
Till then, we are confused, a mixture, unresolved,
unextricated one from the other.
It is in pure, unutterable resolvedness, distinction
of being, that one is free,
not in mixing, merging, not in similarity.
When she has put her hand on my secret, darkest
sources, the darkest outgoings,
when it has struck home to her, like a death, "this
is _him!_"
she has no part in it, no part whatever,
it is the terrible _other_,
when she knows the fearful _other flesh_, ah, dark-
ness unfathomable and fearful, contiguous and
concrete,
when she is slain against me, and lies in a heap
like one outside the house,
when she passes away as I have passed away
being pressed up against the _other_,
then I shall be glad, I shall not be confused with
her,
I shall be cleared, distinct, single as if burnished
in silver,
having no adherence, no adhesion anywhere,
one clear, burnished, isolated being, unique,
and she also, pure, isolated, complete,
two of us, unutterably distinguished, and in
unutterable conjunction.
Then we shall be free, freer than angels, ah,
perfect.