O saisons, O chateaux! La soleil a ete encore retrouvée, what is this madness that steals upon me? If you have not, find "Apparition" by Mallarmé and read it in French. If you don't know French, then it will be requisite for you to learn it, because the ending stanza, the final seven lines of that poem, these are among the most beautiful lines of poetry that I feel I have ever seen in any language. Mallarmé, who I felt to be snubbishly involved to excess with fans and metaphors, has redeemed himself in full, John Donne style.

Today was a beautiful day. I went down to Hawthorne and I ate crepes and I read St. Augustine's Confessions sitting outside in the sun (as they should be read) and smiling and listening to people talk and a poor woman came asking for shelter and people were helping her and I learned that her name was Karen and a nice man bought her a sandwich. I walked around, I examined couples, men, women, children, I contemplated, I let my mind overtake me, I intoned the silent name of God.

And then I came back, played the flute, read some more, ate a fish dinner prepared expertly by one among our very own, and began my essay on St. Augustine who is an unparalleled genius. I am so taken by a sudden rush of excitement and happiness, I doubt if I shall ever get to sleep tonight. For the last ten minutes, I have been translating a poem that rivals even Shakespeare for beauty of language and insight, so rich, such a tableau of rich sounds, and even in French. Solitude and study are the way to beauty and God.

But yet I am not completely sure if I will consign myself to eternal contemplation in chastity. I must of course remember that asceticism is a Christian idea and not a Jewish one. It is fine to study Augustine, but one needs balance for clarity. Of course, in Augustine's journey we see our own, and it is so tempting, that congealing, that gradual coagulation of the truth in one's life, culminating in a cathartic conversion; we want naturally to follow in his footsteps. But we can't, we must seek our own path. And all considered paths lead to God. That is my belief. Various traditions have sprung up, various schools all equally valid as the glistening return to that one.

I have only to breathe, only to trust in myself, only to meditate away this thunder-struck uneasy wonder. It is indeed a goodnight. Tomorrow, schooling. One week left.