Your beautiful letter pleased me greatly; it is food for my soul. (…) There is still nothing in me, still a dark night. Where is the time when I read captivated, strong, brave, St. John of the Cross and with a joyful soul soared so high! The time has passed when we "wove garlands from flowers and selected emeralds at fresh dawns..."
My Teresa, you understand me so well and your soul is such a faithful echo of my soul! Yes, the morning of our life has passed; now it is so difficult, such a laborious midday…
And yet something occurs to me: St. John of the Cross does not say that "the soul weaves garlands at fresh dawns, but from flowers selected at fresh dawns." Thus now, at midday, the soul weaves flowers selected once at fresh dawns…
Now it has nothing to offer its Beloved but a bouquet already picked, it can do nothing else but tie it "with its only hair..."
My beloved Teresa, do you then believe that this only hair of our love is enough?... Do you believe that God does not ask me to select new flowers and new emeralds, to cultivate many virtues, to have "divinely scented desires," but only to bind with love the flowers of fresh dawns?... Well, do you think that now only love is enough? Oh, this thought makes me so joyful…
(Celina Martinová, letter to sister Teresa, KT 154, July 12, 1893)
