[Note: Two academics professionally correspond on the Net; then, one digresses and divulges some personal anecdotes which soon enough take a turn into intimate confessions. One is serious about the communications; the other plays along for the nonce. The latter declines the meeting up proposed by the lady, and the matter ends then and there. One fine day, he receives a packaged gift with the following letter inscribed on the inner flaps of the package which he does not notice then. ]

Lettre à un ami professionel sur le Net découverte seize ans plus tard hier
(Letter to a professional friend on the Net discovered sixteen years later yesterday)

[Note: Two academics professionally correspond on the Net; then, one digresses and divulges some personal anecdotes which soon enough take a turn into intimate confessions. One is serious about the communications; the other plays along for the nonce. The latter declines the meeting up proposed by the lady, and the matter ends then and there. One fine day, he receives a packaged gift with the following letter inscribed on the inner flaps of the package which he does not notice then. ]

"Je suis seule dans ce parc, C....
(I am all alone in this park, C....)

Les fleurs de cerisier sont mortes depuis quelques jours.
(The cherry blossoms have faded some days ago.)

A chaque souffle du vent, elles viennent se poser sur mes pieds, comme des vagues.
(At every waft of the wind, the petals cover my feet like waves.)

Ma vie où tu n'as plus voulu être.
(My life in which you didn't want to be a part of.)

La colère n'est plus là.
(Anger has no place in there.)

Il n'y a pas de retour possible, mais il n'y a non plus le désir de tout oublier.
(There's no possible way of a return, yet there's no desire to forget it all.)

Au contraire.
(On the contrary.)

Tu avais dit une fois que tu n'étais qu'un mythe pour moi.
(You did remark once that you were nothing but a myth to me.)

Tu te trompais alors, comme presque toujours.
(You mistook me then just as you have nearly always.)

Nous deux, ensemble, nous avions forgé le mythe; le plus beau, nous étions le mythe.
(Both of us together had forged the myth; what is even better, we were the myth.)

J'ai voulu te montrer que le mythe subsiste, malgré ta volonté.
(I wanted to prove to you that the myth still survives, despite your obstination.)

Bien sûr, tu es de mon vecu, le maître absolu.
(Of course, you are in my existence, the absolute master.)

A toi de décider: tu peux tout jeter par terre, à cet instant même.
(It is for you to decide: you can fling everything on the ground, right at this very moment.)

Cette preuve que je t'ai envoyée - ce témoignage censer affronter tout le temps à venir,
de ce moment unique, découpé du cours de nos vies, où nos âmes se sont touchées - tu peux la détruire aussi facilement que tu es parti.
(This proof that I sent you - this reminder destined to confront all the future to come, of
this unique moment, a cut out of the flow of our lives where our souls touched each other -
you can destroy as easily as the way you put an end to it all.)

Le feras-tu ? Je ne sais pas.
(Will you do it ? I do not know.)

Je ne veux pas le savoir.
(I do not want to know.)

A......
9.05.2006
Sendai, Japan" 

(c) T. Wignesan, Paris:the translation into English - August 15, 2022.