Letters to a Friend 



have been so present that I must try to fix 

 you a written thought. 



In the afternoon I came up the mountain 

 here with a blanket and a piece of bread to 

 spend the night in prayer among the spouts of 

 the fall. But now what can I say more than 

 wish again that you might expose your soul to 

 the rays of this heaven? 



Silver from the moon illumines this glorious 

 creation which we term falls and has laid a mag 

 nificent double prismatic bow at its base. The 

 tissue of the falls is delicately filmed on the out 

 side like the substance of spent clouds, and the 

 stars shine dimly through it. In the solid shafted 

 body of the falls is a vast number of passing 

 caves, black and deep, with close white convolv 

 ing spray for sills and shooting comet shoots 

 above and down their sides like lime crystals in 

 a cave, and every atom of the magnificent being, 

 from the thin silvery crest that does not dim 

 the stars to the inner arrowy hardened shafts 

 that strike onward like thunderbolts in sound 

 and energy, all is life and spirit, every bolt and 

 [ 120] 



