In front of me is the bunch of dahlias that you brought me yesterday. They remind me of the lovely hours that I was able to have with you, and of our garden and of how absolutely wonderful the world can be in these fall days.
I learned a verse from (Theodor) Storm this week that fits the mood fairly well. The words keep going through my mind like a melody that you can’t get out of your head.
And outside however wild the world runs
Unchristian or Christian
Still the world, the wonderful world is
So completely irrepressible.
And to know that, all I need are just a pair of autumn flowers, a view outside the cell window, and a half-hour of “exercise” in the prison yard where a few beautiful Chestnut and Linden trees stand.
Yet when you get right down to it, for me anyway, the “world” consists of a few people whom I would like to see and be with.
If occasionally on a Sunday I could add the opportunity to hear a good sermon—sometimes the wind brings fragments of the chorale—that would be even better.
Some appropriate photographs of October trees can be found at Vol-Au-Vent’s Flickr page here. Photographs of a Linden tree are here.
