“Why am I writing?” he said in his letter. “I have lost you and there is no more to be said. But ’Though you be standing in the radiance of the Morning Sun, perchance one drop of dew may linger of those your sleeves once gathered in the shadowy garden-walks.’ Did I but think you know how much it costs me to lose you I should derive some comfort.” … The note containing this poem was attached to an ice-cold spray of bamboo, plucked from near the ground and carried with such care that it was still thickly coated with hoarfrost. The messenger was on this, as upon every other occasion, a person whose quality matched the elegance of the letter.
He trimmed his brush with the utmost care, and wrote on exquisite white paper: “No deep drift bars my path, but with their whirling these thin parched snowflakes have bewitched my dizzy brain.” This he tied to a sprig of plum-blossom, and sending for one of his servants, bade him take it not across the garden, but by way of the western gallery.