"J'aime tes jolies fleurs, elles sont charmantes, - j'ai porté une de tes roses hier au soir."

Autograph letter signed "Paul" and addressed to Natalie Clifford Barney, written in black ink on both sides. Silver monogram of the poetess in the upper left corner of the recto.
"Je ne vais pas à la campagne après tout, mon Tout-Petit. Ils sont partis de si bonne heure que j'ai pu trouver un prétexte pour ne pas les accompagner dans ma fatigue et l'heure trop matinale. Quand veux-tu que je vienne te chercher ? et où irons-nous ? Je serai prête à l'heure où tu voudras. J'aime tes jolies fleurs, elles sont charmantes, - j'ai porté une de tes roses hier au soir. A tout à l'heure, mignon Tout-Petit - Paul" ["I'm not going to the countryside after all, my Little One. They left so early that I was able to find an excuse not to accompany them in my fatigue and the too early hour. When do you want me to come get you? and where shall we go? I'll be ready whenever you want. I love your pretty flowers, they are charming, - I wore one of your roses last evening. See you soon, sweet Little One - Paul"]
It was at the end of 1899 and through Violette Shillito that Renée Vivien - then Pauline Tarn - made the acquaintance of Natalie Clifford Barney "this American more supple than a scarf, whose sparkling face shines with golden hair, sea-blue eyes, implacable teeth" (Colette, Claudine à Paris). Natalie, who had just experienced a summer idyll with the sulfurous Liane de Pougy who had initiated her into sapphism, paid only discreet attention to this new acquaintance. Renée, however, was completely captivated by the young American and would recount this coup de foudre in her autobiographical novel Une Femme m'apparut: "J'évoquai l'heure déjà lointaine où je la vis pour la première fois, et le frisson qui me parcourut lorsque mes yeux rencontrèrent ses yeux d'acier mortel, ses yeux aigus et bleus comme une lame. J'eus l'obscur prescience que cette femme m'intimait l'ordre du destin, que son visage était le visage redouté de mon avenir. Je sentis près d'elle les vertiges lumineux qui montent de l'abîme, et l'appel de l'eau très profonde. Le charme du péril émanait d'elle et m'attirait inexorablement. Je n'essayai point de la fuir, car j'aurais échappé plus aisément à la mort." ["I recalled the already distant hour when I saw her for the first time, and the shiver that ran through me when my eyes met her deadly steel eyes, her sharp and blue eyes like a blade. I had the dark prescience that this woman was commanding me to destiny, that her face was the dreaded face of my future. I felt near her the luminous vertigo that rises from the abyss, and the call of very deep water. The charm of peril emanated from her and attracted me inexorably. I did not try to flee from her, for I would have escaped death more easily."] "Winter 1899-1900. Beginning of the idyll. One evening, Vivien is invited by her new friend to the studio of Mrs. Barney [Natalie's mother], 153 avenue Victor-Hugo, at the corner of rue de Longchamp. Natalie ventures to read verses of her composition. When Vivien tells her she loves these verses, she replies that it is better to love the poet. An answer quite worthy of the Amazon." (J.-P. Goujon, Tes blessures sont plus douces que leurs caresses) There followed two years of unequal happiness, punctuated by Natalie's recurring infidelities and Renée's morbid jealousy, whose letters oscillated between impassioned declarations and painful mea culpas. "Renée Vivien is the daughter of Sappho and Baudelaire, she is the flower of evil 1900 with fevers, broken flights, sad voluptuousness." (Jean Chalon, Portrait d'une séductrice)
In 1901 came an important break that would last almost two years; Renée, despite Natalie's solicitations and the intermediaries she sent to win her back, resisted. "The two friends met again, and it was, in August 1905, the pilgrimage to Lesbos, which constituted a disappointment for Natalie Barney and remained without sequel. [...] The spring was definitively broken. The two former friends stopped seeing each other from 1907, and Vivien died without their having met again." (J.-P. Goujon, Ibid.)
Precious and very rare letter from Sappho 1900 to the Amazon.