Typed letter signed (“Leonard”) to Marianne Ihlen ("My dear Marianne"), Hydra, 25 December 1961.

One page, 280 x 215mm.

"It is strange to leave this island, almost as though I haven’t lived here. I never quite believed in it without you. Goodnight, my little ghost, Leonard.”

Cohen's last night in Hydra before departing for Norway. He conveys his plans to take the train from Athens to Oslo, hoping to arrive "a day or so after the New Year." Thinking about their year apart, he writes that “It has occurred to me that I should let you continue in this life of yours, not intrude with my uncertainties. But I cannot forget you. I must see again what happens to us when we are together, perhaps it will be nothing, perhaps everything. Anyhow, we shall see and speak and touch and if it is nothing we shall say so. If it is nothing I’ll get on with my life and you with yours and all we’ll keep of one another will be a few months of sun and long journey north. At least we will be able to say goodbye, something we have never managed."

By descent from Marianne Ihlen.