Delta of Venus

by Anais Nin

  At night he concealed all her clothes in his bed with him, and fell asleep on them, burying his sex in them as if it were into her body. He dreamed of her. The tip of his penis was constantly wet. In the morning there were rings under his eyes.

  She gave him a pair of her stockings. Then she gave him a pair of her black patent leather boots. He placed the boots on his bed. He lay naked now among all her belongings, struggling to create her presence, yearning for her. The shoes looked so alive. They made it appear that she had entered the room and was walking on his bed. He stood them up between his legs to look at them. It seemed as if she were going to walk on his body with her dainty pointed feet, crush him. The thought aroused him. He began to tremble. He drew the boots nearer to his body. Then he brought one near enough to touch the tip of his penis. It aroused him so violently he had an ejaculation all over the shiny leather.

  But this had become a form of torture. He began to write the governess letters, begging her to come to his room at night. She read them with pleasure, right in his presence, her dark eyes glittering, but she would not risk her position.

  Then one day she was called home by the illness of her father. The boy never saw her again. He was left with a devouring hunger for her, and her clothes haunted him.

  One day he made a package of all the clothing and went to a house of prostitution. He found a woman who was physically similar to the governess. He made her dress in the governess’s clothes. He watched her lace up the corset, which lifted up her breasts and set off her buttocks; watched her button the brassière and slip on the panties. Then he asked her to put on the stockings and the boots.

  His excitement was tremendous. He rubbed himself against the woman. He stretched himself at her feet and begged her to touch him with the tip of her boot. She touched his chest first of all, then his belly, then the tip of his penis. This caused him to leap with ardor, and he imagined it was the governess who was touching him.

  He kissed the underclothing and tried to possess the girl, but as soon as she opened her legs to him, his desire died, for where was the little mole?

  Pierre

  When he was a youth, Pierre wandered off toward the quays very early one morning. He had been walking along the river for some time when he was arrested by the sight of a man trying to pull up a nude body from the river to the deck of one of the barges. The body was caught on the anchor chain. Pierre rushed to the man’s help. Together they managed to get the body on the deck.

  Then the man turned to Pierre and said, ‘You wait while I get the police,’ and he ran off. The sun was just beginning to rise, and it touched the naked body with a roseate glow. Pierre saw it was not only a woman, but a very beautiful woman. Her long hair clung to her shoulders and full, round breasts. Her smooth golden skin glistened. He had never seen a more beautiful body, washed clear by the water, with lovely soft contours exposed.

  He watched her with fascination. The sun was drying her. He touched her. She was still warm and must have died but a short while before. He felt for her heart. It was not beating. Her breast seemed to cling to his hand.

  He shivered, then leaned over and kissed the breast. It was elastic and soft under his lips, like a live breast. He felt a sudden violent sexual urge. He continued to kiss the woman. He parted her lips. As he did so, a little water came out from between them, which seemed to him like her very own saliva. He had the feeling that if he kissed her long enough she would come to life. The heat of his lips was passing into hers. He kissed her mouth, her nipples, her neck, her belly, and then his mouth descended to the wet curled pubic hair. It was like kissing her under water.

  She lay stretched out, with her legs slightly parted, her arms straight along her sides. The sun was turning her skin to gold, and her wet hair looked like seaweed.

  How he loved the way her body lay, exposed and defenseless. How he loved her closed eyes and slightly opened mouth. Her body had the taste of dew, of wet flowers, of wet leaves, of early morning grass. Her skin was like satin under his fingers. He loved her passivity and silence.

  He felt himself burning, tense. Finally he fell on her, and as he began to penetrate her, water flowed from between her legs, as if he were making love to a naiad. His movements caused her body to undulate. He continued to thrust himself into her, expecting at any moment to feel her response, but her body merely moved in rhythm with his.

  Now he was afraid the man and the police would arrive. He tried to hurry and satisfy himself, but he couldn’t. He had never taken so long. The coolness and wetness of the womb, her passivity, his enjoyment so prolonged – yet he could not come.

  He moved desperately, to rid himself of his torment, to inject his warm liquid into her cold body. Oh, how he wanted to come at this moment, while kissing her breasts, and he frantically urged his sex within her, but still he could not come. He would be found there by the man and the policeman, lying over the body of the dead woman.

  Finally he lifted her body from the waist, bringing her up against his penis and pushing violently into her. Now he heard shouts all around, and at that moment he felt himself exploding inside of her. He withdrew, dropped the body, and ran away.

  This woman haunted him for days. He could not take a shower without remembering the feel of the wet skin and seeing how she shone in the dawn. Never again would he see so beautiful a body. He could not hear rain without remembering how the water came out between her legs and out of her mouth, and how soft and smooth she was.

  He felt he had to escape from the city. After a few days, he found himself in a fishing village, and stumbled on a row of cheaply built artists’ studios. He rented one. He could hear everything through the walls. In the middle of the row of studios, next to Pierre’s, was a community water closet. When he lay trying to sleep, he suddenly caught a faint streak of light between the wall boards. He applied his eye to a crack and saw, standing before the water closet, with one hand resting on the wall, a boy of about fifteen.

  He had taken down his pants halfway and opened his shirt, bowing his curled head over his labor. In his right hand, he was thoughtfully fingering his young sex. Now and then he pressed it hard and a convulsion shook his body. In the dim light, with his curly hair and young pale body, he looked quite like an angel, except for the fact that he was holding his sex in his right hand.

  He dropped his other hand from the wall where it had been resting and took hold of his balls very firmly, while he continued to maul, press and squeeze his penis. It did not get very hard. He was experiencing pleasure, but he could not reach a climax. He was disappointed. He had tried every motion of finger and hand. Now he held his limp penis wistfully. He weighed it, puzzled over it and then covered it within his pants, buttoned his shirt and left the place.

  Pierre was wide awake now. The memory of the drowned woman haunted him again, mingled now with the picture of the young boy playing with himself. He was lying there, tossing, when a light again appeared from the water closet. Pierre could not keep from looking. Sitting there was a woman of about fifty, enormous, solid, with a heavy face and gluttonous mouth and eyes.

  She had only sat for a moment when someone tried the door. Instead of sending him away, she opened it. And there appeared the boy who had been there earlier. He was amazed that the door had opened. The old woman did not move from the seat but drew him in with a smile and closed the door.

  ‘What a lovely boy you are,’ she said. ‘Surely you must have a little friend already, no? Surely you must already have had a little pleasure with women?’

  ‘No,’ said the boy timidly.

  She talked to him easily, as if they had met in the street. He had been taken by surprise and stared at her. All he could see was her full-lipped mouth smiling and her insinuating eyes.

  ‘Never had any pleasure at all, my boy, you can’t tell me that?’

  ‘No,’ said the boy.

  ‘Don’t you know how?’ asked the woman. ‘Haven’t your friends in school told you how?’

  �
�Yes,’ said the boy, ‘I have seen them do it, with their right hand they do it. I tried, but nothing happened.’

  The woman laughed. ‘But there is another way. Never learned another way, really? No one told you anything? You mean you only know how to do it with your own hand? Why, there’s another way that always works.’

  The boy eyed her with suspicion. But her smile was wide, generous, reassuring.

  The caresses he had given himself must have left a certain disturbance in him, because he made a step toward the woman.

  ‘What’s the way you know?’ he said with curiosity.

  She laughed.

  ‘You really want to know, eh? And what happens if you enjoy it? If you really enjoy it, will you promise to come and see me again?’

  ‘I promise,’ said the boy.

  ‘Well, then, climb on my lap, this way, just kneel on me, don’t be afraid, now.’

  The middle of his body was just at the same level as her big mouth. She deftly unbuttoned his pants and took out the small penis. The boy watched her with amazement as she took it into her mouth.

  Then, as her tongue began to move and the small penis grew larger, the boy was taken with such pleasure that he fell forward over her shoulder and let her mouth take in his whole penis and touch the pubic hair. What he felt was so much more stimulating than when he had tried to manipulate himself. All that Pierre could see now was the big full-lipped mouth working on the delicate penis, now and then letting it halfway out of the cavern, and then swallowing it altogether until nothing showed but the hair around it.

  The old woman was gluttonous but patient. The boy was exhausted with pleasure, almost swooning over her head, and the blood was coming to her face. Still she vigorously chewed and licked, until the boy began to tremble. She had to put both her arms around him or he might have shaken himself out of her mouth. He began to utter moaning sounds like some cooing bird. She went at him more feverishly, and then it happened. The boy almost fell asleep on her shoulder from exhaustion, and she had to unclasp him gently with her big hands. He smiled wanly and ran out.

  *

  While he lay there Pierre remembered a woman he had known who was already fifty when he was only seventeen. She was a friend of his mother’s. She was eccentric and willful and still dressed in fashions of ten years earlier, which meant wearing an endless number of petticoats, tight corsets, long and heavily laced panties, and full-skirted dresses that were cut very low over her breasts so Pierre could see the little valley between them, a black shadowy line vanishing inside the lace and frills.

  She was a handsome woman, with luxuriant reddish hair and a fine down over her skin. Her ears were small and delicate, her hands plump. Her mouth was particularly attractive – very red, naturally so, with great fullness and width, and with small, even teeth, which she always showed, as if she were about to bite into something.

  She came to visit his mother one very rainy day when the servants were out. She shook her filmy umbrella, took off her important hat, and unloosened her veil. As she stood there, her long dress all wet, she began to sneeze. Pierre’s mother was already in bed with the grippe. She called out from her room, ‘Darling, do take off your clothes if they are wet, and Pierre will dry them for you before the fire. There is a screen in the parlor. You can undress there and Pierre will give you a kimono of mine.’

  Pierre hustled about with evident eagerness. He got the kimono from his mother and he opened the screen. In the parlor there was a beautiful fire burning brightly in the fireplace. The room was warm and smelled of narcissus, which filled every vase, of the wood fire, of the visitor’s sandalwood perfume.

  From behind the screen she handed her dress to Pierre. It was still warm and scented from her body. He held it in his arms and smelled it, intoxicated, before laying it over a chair before the fire. Then she handed him a large, very full petticoat, the hem extremely wet and covered with mud. He sniffed at this with pleasure before placing it, too, before the fire.

  Meanwhile she talked and smiled and laughed unconcernedly, not noticing his excitement. She threw him another petticoat, a lighter one, warm and musky. Then, with a shy laugh, she threw him her long, lace-edged panties. Suddenly Pierre realized that they were not wet, that this was unnecessary, that she had thrown them at him because she wanted to and that now she stood nearly naked behind the screen, knowing he was aware of her body.

  As she looked at him over the top of the screen, he could see her full, rounded shoulders, soft and gleaming, like cushions. She laughed and called out to him, ‘Give me the kimono now.’

  ‘Aren’t your stockings wet, too?’ said Pierre.

  ‘Yes, indeed they are. I am taking them off.’ She leaned down. He could imagine her snapping loose the garters and unrolling the stockings. He wondered what her legs looked like, her feet. He could contain himself no longer and gave the screen a pull.

  It fell down before her and exposed her in the pose he had pictured. She was leaning down and unrolling her black stockings. Her whole body had the golden color and delicate texture of her face. It was long-waisted, full-breasted, ample, but firm.

  She was unaffected by the fall of the screen. She said, ‘Now look what I have done taking my stockings off. Hand me the kimono.’ He approached, staring at her – the first naked woman he had seen, so much like paintings he had studied in the museum.

  She was smiling. Then she covered herself as if nothing had happened and went to the fire, extending her hand to the heat. Pierre was completely unnerved. His body was burning, yet he did not quite know what to do about it.

  She was careless about holding the kimono around her, intent on warming herself. Pierre sat at her feet and stared at her smiling, open face. Her eyes seemed to invite him. He moved closer to her, still kneeling. Suddenly she opened the kimono, took his head between her hands, placed it on her sex for his mouth to feel. The tendrils of pubic hair touched his lips and maddened him. At that very moment his mother’s voice came from the far-off bedroom. ‘Pierre! Pierre!’

  He straightened himself. His mother’s friend closed her kimono. They were left trembling, burning, unsatisfied. The friend went to his mother’s room, sat at the foot of her bed and chatted with her. Pierre sat with them, nervously waiting until the woman was ready to get dressed again. The afternoon seemed endless. Then, finally, she rose and said she must dress. But Pierre’s mother detained him. She wanted something to drink. She wanted the curtains drawn. She kept him occupied until the friend was dressed. Had she guessed what might have been happening in the parlor? Pierre was left with the touch of her hair and rosy skin on his lips, nothing else.

  When the friend left, his mother talked to him in the half-dark room.

  ‘Poor Mary Ann,’ she said. ‘Did you know, a terrible thing happened to her when she was young. It was when the Prussians invaded Alsace-Lorraine. She was raped by soldiers. And now she will not let a man near her.’

  The image of Mary Ann being violated inflamed Pierre. He could barely conceal his disturbance. Mary Ann had trusted his youth and innocence. She had lost her fear of men with him. He was like a child to her. So she had permitted his young, tender face between her legs.

  That night he dreamed of soldiers tearing her clothes, spreading her legs, and he awakened with a violent desire for her. How could he see her now? Would she ever let him do more to her than kiss her sex gently as he had done? Was she closed forever?

  He wrote her a letter. He was amazed when he received an answer. She asked him to come and see her. Wearing a loose robe, she greeted him in a dimly lighted room. His first movement was to kneel before her. She smiled indulgently. ‘How gentle you are,’ she said. Then she pointed to a wide divan in the corner and stretched herself on it. He stretched himself beside her. He felt timid and could not move.

  Then he felt her hand deftly inserting itself under his belt, slipping inside his pants, sliding along, close to the belly, arousing every bit of flesh she touched, gliding, descending.

&nbs
p; The hand stopped at his pubic hair, played with it, moved around the penis without touching it. It began to stir. He thought if she touched his penis it would kill him with pleasure. His mouth opened with the suspense.

  Her hand continued to move slowly, slowly around and over his pubic hair. A finger sought the tiny rivulet between the hair and the sex where the skin was smooth, sought every sensitive part of the young man, slid along under his penis, pressed his balls.

  Finally her hand closed around his throbbing penis. And it was a shock of such intense pleasure that he sighed. His own hand went out, blindly fumbling through her clothes. He, too, wanted to touch the core of her sensations. He, too, wanted to glide along and enter into her secret places. He fumbled with her clothes. He found an opening. He touched her pubic hair and the rivulet between the leg and the mount of Venus, felt the tender flesh, found moisture and dipped his finger into it.

  Then in a frenzy he tried to push his penis into her. He saw all the soldiers charging into her. The blood rushed to his head. She thrust him away and would not let him take her. She whispered in his ear, ‘Only with the hands,’ and then lay open to him while continuing to caress him inside his pants.

  When he again turned over to push his wild sex against her she pushed him away, angrily this time. Her hand aroused him, and he could not lie still.

  She said, ‘I will make you come this way. Enjoy yourself.’ He lay back quietly enjoying the caresses. But as soon as he closed his eyes he saw the soldiers bending over her naked body, he saw her legs forced apart, the opening dripping from the attacks, and what he felt resembled the furious panting desire of the soldiers.

  Mary Ann suddenly closed her robe and stood up. She had grown completely cold now. She sent him away, and he was never allowed to see her again.

  At forty Pierre was still a very handsome man, whose successes with women, and the long and now broken liaison with Elena, had given the local people much to talk about in the small country place where he had settled. He was now married to a very delicate and charming woman, but two years after their marriage her health had grown poor and she was a semi-invalid. Pierre had loved her ardently, and his passion at first seemed to revive her but slowly had become a danger to her weak heart. Finally her doctor advised against all lovemaking, and poor Sylvia entered into a long period of chastity. Pierre, too, was suddenly deprived of his sexual life.