Soren Kierkegaard to Regine Olsen, Andre Demers (December 2025)

Soren Kierkegaard to Regine Olsen

1849 

O, now, Mrs. Schlegel, my salutations must 
Forgo the possessive I would always use 
With my beloved exclamation marks 
To address you who I think of now and then, 
As per your request, though you need not have asked it, 
For it was bound to be since the world’s beginning 
That you would haunt my days and bless my life, 
And I would think of you perpetually, 
And have you in the corner of my mind 
Throughout the many businesses of the day. 
Words are too weak to write out my heart’s wishes, 
And it has taken me so long to give 
The explanation that you so deserve, 
Yes, coming on a decade, in which I saw you 
So many times but never spoke with you, 
As I would do now for a better world’s sake, 
For closure, for nostalgia, for sweet friendship, 
For the forgiveness I do not deserve 
From you, that would be like a mountain cure, 
Treating my wasting body with human kindness, 
To win me peace now everything else has failed. 
And now I ask this meeting through your husband, 
Subservient to your wills that are one will, 
And if it must be so, let us only write 
Each other. Search your heart, confer with God, 
And then maybe believe that I mean well 
To reach out like this after so long has passed. 
I could not help it, as I could not help it 
When I chose to be the murderer of your self, 
In giving you back that ring, in being cold, 
As if you were a book that I could close.  
It may be painful to bring up the past, 
But I am only asking that the pain 
Of being wronged may fade with all made right; 
Let not our recollections be unpleasant 
For we must be forever remembering. 
But do not so easily forgive me. Listen 
To the long speech that I’ve rehearsed for years. 
In the long struggle to explain myself to me 
My love of you has been the greatest teacher, 
And all our woe was for its competition 
With my love of God, and the wretched life of the mind.  
O, what is there to learn from pain and guilt 
Now their occasions are long in the past, 
But gratitude and utter harmlessness,   
And the wisdom and humility of submission?
Regine, I prostrate myself before you, 
And you may ease my guilt with but a word; 
Why not initiate the correspondence, 
When often we chance upon each other walking? 
I have no right to do it, but you may. 
I have so often wondered if it is chance 
Or our own will that we are ignorant of, 
That we must find each other day after day. 
I know I purposefully chose other paths 
Than yours some days. Our silences were such 
As we had shared in the old days, but sadder, 
And if you spoke the tingling timelessness 
Would cease, and people would talk of how we talked. 
O, let them talk, but deign to talk to me, 
Return my smile with more than just a smile, 
And let our fancies have a little dance. 

I always was so old compared to you, 
And sometimes thought I might die many years 
Before you, waiting torturously in Heaven 
Until earth gives you up. Maybe the years 
I had on you made a mismatch of our minds, 
Yet I surmise that if we shared a birth year, 
I would still have botched the duties of a husband. 
I had no choice but to deceive you, and 
Chose to deceive you into the truth that parting 
And marrying another would make you happiest, 
By acting wholly crueller than my nature, 
Rather than lie that I could make you happy; 
But acting is being, and if I have been cruel, 
It has been to be kind. Forgive this murderer, 
For leading you on, for lacking the self-knowledge 
That I was never constituted for 
The married life. For the melancholy that 
I might’ve striven to alter in my nature; 
I do confess it was a muse to me 
That vied with you for faithfulness. And for  
My being called on to forsake the ethical life 
For the religious, through you by our God, 
Who cannot be blamed for making you my teacher, 
For asking me to put you on the altar 
Like Isaac, to send you out into the wild 
A scapegoat sin-encumbered in the dark. 
Thank you for bearing my sins, and if you would, 
Think of me as a brother or a friend, 
And know all I want is to be reconciled. 
Now we can never go back, but if we could, 
I think that I would not choose otherwise, 
But I would have been gentler than I was. 
What a great monster I have been to you, 
For doing the kindest wisest thing, which I 
Only should have done sooner. O, blind love!   
Nor would I, were you free, marry you now. 
At least I think so; if I heard your voice, 
I might feel different. My memory of it, 
Like that of music, cannot fade, but no 
Instrument but your mouth can make its sound, 
Though I know one: my pen, that to the world 
Will trumpet you as a presence in my work, 
And bathe you in the fame you care not for, 
Because you meant so much to me. It is 
A gift, like a rose or a bottle of some fine essence, 
That you may scorn as vanity. I give it 
Because I bless your soul to live forever, 
To be known by strangers generations hence, 
Because I have nothing nobler to give, 
Though I would leave you my estate if you 
Would have it, or steward it to charity. 
And may your earthly life be long and happy,  
Longer than mine for sure, that would have gained 
Much from less work and more companionship. 
Yes, in the future as the past I wasted 
So many years scorning love’s panacea, 
That I might make my name in history; 
Then take it in the spirit of the eternal law,  
If not the letter of the temporal law, 
For in the resurrection none are married, 
But all have names written in light on their hearts. 
May you be dear to all posterity 
For being the inspiration of my works. 
May you be blessed and happy and at peace.