Note by JRW: The following is an extract from a handwritten letter by Myatt, addressed to me. He dated it Late September.
Late September Summer Sun
There is only one thing more beautiful to me - one thing more which can bring such silent slow-falling tears of joy - than being alone in a rural field in England on a warm sunny day of blue sky, far from human noise, hearing only the song, the call, of birds, the breeze in leaves, grass, bush; seeing only tree, hedge, hand-sown crops, and grass. And that one thing is a woman: one who feels as I, who has the empathy, who understands the numen so presenced here, in Nature.
There is then a new earthly-being from the joining which silently, together, exults to become a wordless, joyful unity with the life, the greater-being, so presenced. No wonder then that I am annoyed when such a silence, such a field, such numinosity, is destroyed. No wonder then there is a sadness of loneliness.
How can I leave this land, to dwell elsewhere? Each day, each week, each month of each dark dull day in Winter is endured to savour such a warmth as this: I am at peace here, under Sun, where flies fly noisy from shade to warmth of Sun, and plants, feeling it is Spring, flower, again - to feed the still abounding flying, feeding, life around.
Truth, history, learning, sorrow, wisdom - all here. There has to be the sadness for it was born from the suffering that had to be - mine, others - to bear the gift of that empathy which changed and still changes this one life which as the Cumulus clouds drift and drifted on one world among so many.
So I cannot, must not, exchange this hard-won peace, this brief Sun, this growing, this silence of sorrow, for the following of some cause in some land, far distant. It is this warm silence that I seek, that heals, that bears the very purpose and meaning of life. All that they suffered, toiled, died for I am - I have become. So there is peace when I remember as the flowering plant remembers to flower just as when, forgetting, I wander back, impatient - empathy's dormant Winter - to where those urban ways of abstract, disconnected thoughts traverse the Earth as dry poisoned dust, wind-borne, destroys.
Soon, there will be rain - already the clouds have come to cover the wonderful healing warmth of Sun. So I must remember, endure the six-month wait for the beauty, the warmth of one more English Summer.
This morning as I worked the Church bells tolled the Sunday hour, and I was pleased until, a mile or more distant, a raucous chain-saw sounded. It is the Crane-fly season - hordes fly up as I walk - and I wonder how long can such silence, such fields, such peace, such memories, survive?
DW Myatt