May 1st.
I said to myself to-day: “Do you really believe that the world would heed that poem? Do you think that if any publisher published it, he could sell it?” I answered, “No, I do not.”
If one took it I should think I was making a fool of him. I offer it on that chance!
—What am I going to do? I do not know. I must try to find some work that does not tear me to pieces; and then perhaps some day I shall be able to write something different.
May 3d.
My whole soul is in a turmoil these days. I struggle,—I can not give up while I live; but for what do I struggle? I am a man journeying in a thicket; I can not see one step before me.
—I try to forget myself—I try to get interested in a book. But I never had but one kind of interest. I can not get used to living without a purpose, without enthusiasm, without morality.
I have no ideas any more. My whole life is shrunken and contracted. It is all stagnant—the garden of my soul is full of weeds. The broad fields that I used to cover, the far-off things I used to strive for—what have they to do with me now?