the color of your soul? What is the color of your skin? O you despairers of destiny! O you plunderers of time! you make a great noise in the silences: All that you need to do is to open your eyes: that is the secret: look: You come to me; I cant look for you: I can only say, look: I cant give you a free pass to the promised land: I can only say look: if you only look you will need no pass: O, why do you bury your face in the dust? get up: lift yourself high enough to look over your own head: Everything you love is yours. YOU WRITERS You writers who are trying to write. You artists anywhere who are trying for art. You who may be successful but have not arrived. You who hold yourselves in a class apart and play the game of temperament. You fools, liars, ornamenters, hypocrites, prostitutes, of words. You who wouldn't sell your bodies but who sell your souls. You who have taken to the street for profit. You who hunger for flattery and thirst for fame. You betrayers of the people. You who put words on yourselves as chains. You who are goods to the highest bidder. All of you. I have something to say to you. You may have said it to yourself. But I'm going to say it anyhow. Both for your good and mine. Something serious. Something that goes to the root. I'll talk right out. For somehow you who might be are not. You to whom a trust is given have betrayed it. I believe in the sacredness of the word. I want words to be gods, paradises, service. I want words to live. I want words to be creators. Some writers are so vital they cant say and or the or but without thrilling you. There are some writers so dead they cant say immortality without a funeral. I want the living word. How can I get it? By using words instead of being used by words. By speaking out of my heart instead of out of books. By not trying to write. By living. Some authors write as if they never had been born. They say: I did my best. I say: Rather your worst. When you talk to me face to face you are worth every minute. When you talk to me on paper in a book you are a waste of time. What happens to a man in the period between what he feels and what he does? What catastrophe occurs? Why does he go to smash in the process? He is so alive in what he humanly and so dead in what he professionally says. What is the poison that comes between? Money? Prestige? Or is it some false principle of art? Do your words, do your colors, do your tones, take you away from rather than towards your inspiration? You try too hard. You shouldn't try at all. An artist's sketches are wonderful. His finished canvases are commonplace. His sketches are impromptu. His paintings are designed. He did the sketches. The paintings did him. He didn't try in the sketches. He was all try in the paintings. You writers who are trying to write. Are you trying to live? I admit your display. I admit your phrases. But you? Do I admit you? Yes.