Liefsteling. Iris is out; went to buy some cigarettes; we were on the beach today, burnt; hitchhiked there and back; I was quite crabby after your phone call because one can’t properly communicate that way; it’s like this – everything magnified and out of context, because words are all there is, without facial expression or the touch of a hand – the rushed conversation because time is gold; etc. etc. But our time lies ahead. Had a letter of confirmation from Van Riebeeck Hotel addressed to you; they say they have a mountain view for us, with breakfast. I asked because we had a sea view last time – and “we would like to have you again”. Civilised, at least. So, golden, valuable, precious, whole, again.
Did I tell you I read Lobolo again? And each time I know you better, I love you more; still a little scared to go through Orgie again, have a week’s “holiday” – when it will happen. Busy on my play ’n Seun na My Hart [A Boy after My Own Heart]. Did you ever read it? Uys says he and I should rewrite it together. I wonder if you and I …?
I miss you, far away, strange, but still, you remain strange. “The paradox” of love. As you once put it. Always amazed. “Always born outside of me …” And yet … Maybe because of that, “make love”.
For always,
Cocoon.
PS: Did I write to tell you I visited Nico in hospital? God, but he’s confused – recognised me only occasionally. Funny, too. He teases the man next to him – the man upsets him because he sometimes ignores him. Nico can’t hold onto anything – coordination gone to hell – and speaks with difficulty even though he speaks so rudely – and laughs.
It’s now early Friday morning, I want to quickly go and post this. Have already forgotten what the other news is – the bra-parcel very cute. If one had a baby you wouldn’t need to take anything out. Now I’ll put it away nicely till you come – just had to wear it once. And how do you look in your charcoal affair? You must bring it with you next month. Have I told you yet that Stephen [Etienne Leroux] and Renée [his wife] like Rook en Oker very much and Bartho does too – the party at Stephen and Renée’s was lovely – wish you’d been there – it reminded me a bit of old Bill’s. Morning, beautiful. Must rush off now to post. Be good, my little elephant with the little trunk.
Cocoon.
Potchefstroom
Sunday night, 29 December 1963
My own darling, Cocoon, Ingrid,
A few moments of quiet before I have to bath Anton. Had a lovely swim this afternoon, and yesterday. But I’m still far too white. I’ll do my best to add a bit of earth-brown before I come down so as not to embarrass you too much, divine little woman. Tonight in just three weeks’ time we’ll do another of those long walks along the sea, cut off from the organisations of hate, completely happy, and together. And shortly thereafter: inside each other. I have a very physical need for you, too!
Before I go on and forget to mention it: forgive me the “ignorance” of my poor memory, but who wrote “For each man kills the thing he loves”? I want to use it as an epigraph in Orgie and need the information URGENTLY. In between translating Die Ambassadeur. I’m also typing up Orgie. On nice stiff white sheets, with a new typewriter ribbon. Looks impressive; I’ve done quite a thorough revision. Want to hand it over to Bartho as early as January so I can work with [Marc] Achleitner on the typography, otherwise there’ll be delays and misunderstandings. Orgie isn’t a major work; but it has to be poetic, and pure. It’s very important because it’s so completely ours.
The final sentence of the dedication now reads: “All of this, conjoined, is hereby yours, with love: ‘private words addressed to you in public’ (T.S. Eliot).” Happy?
“News”? It’s a morgue, this place. I’m working sixteen hours a day. (But The Ambassador will be done by tomorrow; Christie’s Retha is going to type it up.) I’ve seen Christie twice, and will see him again tonight – “they” (!) are going away the day after tomorrow – but he’s very subdued, doesn’t ask any questions, and refrains from offering unsolicited comment. Actually it’s all rather uncomfortable.
Bill sent a Christmas card (as “subtle” as a bull in a china shop): with a picture he took in France when he visited us there. And a note: “Come over for a chat some time”!!!
Otherwise: a different kind of hell: Estelle drives me round the bend playing the “patient, long-suffering wife”. As if there’s nothing wrong. But I keep to myself. And, thank god, we sleep in complete separation. After New Year she and her mother are going to Pretoria for a few days.
That’s about it.
Delightful child: (good – completely good – child?) I love you, find life in you and wish to bring you living water; thank you for sending me those precious, lovely lines; wait sweetly and quietly, with restrained passion. Before very long I’ll be there. Then our new memory will begin. Then, together, we can write a new stanza for our lovely poem. We’ll suspend time, in just “one blind deed” of love and trust that keeps us pure and human. With much love, and with everything, always,
André.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Castella
30 December 1963
My dearest and most jealous god of the elephants with tiny trunks – lord of my heart, prince, André,
Your two letters arrived simultaneously on Saturday – the one where you’re so the hell-in with Potch and the stranger-family (but don’t you know you have to make your own family, your friends? God, then you can at least use your own discretion!) and the jealous one from Christmas Day – after which I lay in a swoon for 24 hours – or I swooned, as Iris and I now say. I already feel afraid when I share a bed with another man, afraid that you’ll be angry and afraid for the whole false situation in which we find ourselves. And then you still talk …! (I forgot to say, it was excruciating for two hours, just until I fell asleep, and then I woke up again and went and lay with Simone.)
Seems to me you think everything here is always friendly and kind, but Jack is sometimes so morose and unpleasant towards me, there’s almost constant tension, and ever since your phone call, petulance and open quarrelling. You’re not the only one trying to make life “liveable”! I don’t want to argue with you too. I just want to say. And I say it softly, considerately, and I am holding your hand nicely, and see your mouth like that time at the 191 when you said: Your hand, which will never manage to turn me away from you. Listen, darling, I do love you, I am even more prepared to stay with you always. Do you understand? But before you can come to me like that, I am afraid of all hope, all surrender to possibilities … always possibilities … I don’t want to be “killed by a dream”, to quote myself. And it will be devastating for our relationship as it is now. And that’s why I try, in spite of my oneness and connection with you, to simply accept things as they are. Fine, if I am not allowed to lie with other men – I understand that you will be jealous because you love me, but Estelle is after all also someone, and someone you once loved and with whom you stay; and I don’t WHINE like that!
And now; another thing – the “camp”, the “John Kannemeyer” – little heart, you also “keep up appearances” – which you so kick against in your letter. You must decide – as indeed you did once decide, whether we don’t dare rescue ourselves from this entrapment – if I win the prize I can take you with me overseas – there is nothing I’d rather do. And before I dream about that – child, everyone will know that Estelle is also in Cape Town and that I am just running off with you: which puts me in a highly unpoetic light. But I am prepared to do it. So you mustn’t get so terribly jealous. I also have to live in a reality here, such as it is. I have to take the child somewhere for Christmas, and I haven’t been invited to my parents. I suppose I’ve preached enough now, hey? And I framed your beautiful portrait, and tomorrow I’ll be eating with Koos – and I still work in the grey pit – like a big human rat – darling treasure, you must see Castella now – we’ve arranged it to make room for Iris – a lovely person – the bedroom is her room and “studio”, mine is the “library”, and Simone’s little
cubbyhole is the “study”. She, Iris, knows about you, of course – if we want to be alone we’ll simply lock her in her room! And now I have to go and eat. Oh yes, your “greeting”, which is now far more literary, is less beautiful than your heartfelt greeting. You must use the original in Orgie.
Yours with longing and flaws and joy and love and again longing and a salute for the 15th.
Cocoon Cocoon.
Potchefstroom
31 December 1963
My darling, mine,
Thank you for this morning’s lovely, desolate letter, so full of rebellion against the dourness you’ve had to endure there; and so desperate to make the estranged me closer and truer. I want you to know, my Cocoon, my Ingrid, that you have been especially close to me over the past few days. That I lay alone in the room this morning for a long time, half-sleeping, half-awake, dreaming up a long scene with you: we had a house, a Malay type of dwelling, double-storeyed, just a little box with windows top and bottom, with a little door, and it was dazzlingly white. I was sitting and typing; you were on your way back from work and I went to meet you, one block up, under shady trees. As we began kissing each other, our clothes fell away, right there in the street with its patches of sunlight and pools of shade – and we walked back arm-in-arm, God, so happy.
And so my day began, with beauty and feeling – New Year’s Eve.
This year of thankfulness and truth is over. Will the year ahead be one of fulfilment? Why do I believe so strongly that we won’t be apart next year this time?
This is no mere adolescent yearning. I want to marry you and be with you; be a father to our children, contented and fulfilled. I’ve had enough of emptiness and lack of contact and a life with no physical touch because it is devoid of spiritual content.
Stop.
Christie’s just arrived, so I’ll continue writing later.
Later. Once again, thank you, little child, for what you opened up and liberated inside of me this year, allowing me to remain open, from now on and always, to the winds of paradise and to you, fleet-footed child. (Leucodendron: how are things with you?)
I’m off to Johannesburg this afternoon, just for two days, staying with Naas Steenkamp. Anton will remain behind in Potch. Be back here on the 2nd. Please continue writing. From Monday the 6th you can send letters to Grahamstown again.
And then – and then: the two of us in our bedroom facing the mountain, to which we can raise our eyes when we need help. I’ll wear my lovely sweater, and you your naughty bra-and-panties. This time I’m going to take beautiful pictures of you. With those exquisite breasts of yours, you’ll be full and voluptuous. (But won’t it be too late for us, yet again, to make a moesie-girl? Your last period came a little early, didn’t it?)
Keep working on the play. You told me about it; but you’ve yet to send it to me for reading. And yes: let’s work on it together. Not Uys!
I still want to write a new story for Bartho’s anthology. Apparently pictures of all of us will be appearing on the back cover. I told them to order one of you from Desmond.
And now it’s time to take my leave of you, you with your lovely, precious parts: I hail your dreams, your words of tenderness and wonder; your sleepy, truth-laden eyes. I hail your hands so full of compassion; your shoulders with their freckles; tummy with its shadows softly playing in the light; the small, dear, tanned back; your breathtaking buttocks, delicious legs, fleet feet; and a parting shot, deep and long, passionate and tender, with mouth and hands and eventually the papie itself, for the cocoon of quietude and fire, the essence of dance, with its secrets about the future, beginning tomorrow.
And a wish for the New Year: that it will indeed be new.
And happy.
And serene.
With love, and more love, whispers and a song,
Yours,
André.
Thursday, 2 January 1964
LOVE AND BORN BUTTERFLIES FOR OUR NEW YEAR MY PRINCE = COCOON
Castella
Thursday, 2 January 1964
My dearest Prince,
Prince of poets. And Prince, God, stupidest, “Yet each man kills the thing he loves …”, “The Ballad of Reading Gaol” – Oscar Wilde – I’ll send you a book about it:
Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
…
Some do it with a bitter look,
…
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!
…
For each man kills the thing he loves,
Yet each man does not die.
Or something like that. I’ll send the complete thing. Beautiful ballad.
Darling, my own André P. Brink, I am sorry about my angry and ill-considered letter the other day, but “everything is necessary” and your two letters today were so amiable; don’t know what I would do without them. I got up at 10:30 this morning and in my pyjamas tottered out sleep-drunk to the postbox and they aroused me; and then I felt like such a CAT about my last letter; but more than anything I was upset about your unhappiness and our separation and the fact that we cannot surrender completely because always maybe, maybe, maybe, and now your leaving and the “deceit” – “the battalions of lies and the organizations of hate”; but never mind, never mind, my papie, when we get to our island again on the 17th the doubts will disappear so easily and naturally and freely and mercifully.
Child, it’s one o’clock; really tired and burnt to hell, I want to be brown when you come again, you really don’t have to worry about your whiteness – and then you’ll always have your lovely brown moesies and your long big papie which opens me up and hurts and heals so beautifully.
Your innocent white paper; your new typewriter ribbon – your Orgie. When you come, we’ll go through it word for word; Child. Yes, the dedication is lovely. And I believe in your love and I am proud of it, that someone like you “can love ignoble me …”
Glad Christie’s behaving better; Bill’s postcard message is a scream. Poor thing.
Little “martyr” woman – I do, nevertheless, feel sorry for her; and GUILTY.
Yes, completely well-behaved. And you are nearby and good; it’s so good … You say “thank you for the lovely lines”– does that refer to a LETTER from me? Thank you for your telegram – I froze when I thought your father might open mine because you wrote you’d be away for a few days – the “born butterflies” is our baby, out of the papie-cocoon. Dream …?
Now your two letters are mixed up. We’re still going to get that Malay house; I’ve already chosen it; just from the outside, beautiful, white, without a stoep. Heavy door, and cheap. Hey, I object: “I am sitting and typing and working, you were on your way back from WORK …!” Good God.
Wait a while with Orgie; we’ll do it together; you need to get rid of all the self-pity; remember your “glowing sadness”, don’t be in such a hurry, my love; just be in a hurry with me.
Leucodendron; means Silver Tree. It’s nice and sore and happy. Full breasts with “the milk of human kindness” (hopefully).
Iris and I alone on New Year’s Eve; waited up till twelve o’clock: slept; entertained [?] 1st; only went to the beach today.
No, time’s right (according to my calculations) for the moesie-girl – ours. It’s probably also not very wise … and won’t old Piet then come and take Simone away …? But I so badly want to be pregnant with you.
I’ll keep the play for us. Small parts (intimate conversations) I’ve reworked in Rook en Oker and will have to find other images. They must put our photos next to one another on the anthology’s back cover … Sentimental …!
Thank you again, my heart, for all the beautiful things you are and which you give to me – and sleep sweetly and happily, I love you and would so much like to have you here always. I draw a cross on your forehead; good night, good morning, tomorrow through the little curtains, and to the moesies and your hands and your heart that beats and to your beautiful tooth, which doesn’t always want to listen.
With love,
Your Cocoon. Kontjie.
Non Con.
PS: What else did you get for Christmas? IJ.
{Braaksma (cultural attaché for the Netherlands) sent me a beautiful diary for Christmas. IJ.}
Potchefstroom
Sunday night, 5 January 1964
Beloved mine,
I’ve isolated myself here in my brother’s room to share with you, once more, my drawn-out days of longing since I last wrote. However, it’s no longer a matter of dejection or simply feeling trapped. And it’s more than just the fact that, tonight in two weeks’ time, you and I will go walking far into the dark of Gordon’s Bay together … It’s a very interior kind of restfulness, a belief that we have now arrived quite close to a point of acceleration.
The general atmosphere here has also changed – I mean the oppressive “family atmosphere” I fulminated about in one of my recent letters. My people and I have rediscovered a sense of connection after planing away the inevitable differences that arise following six months of total estrangement. I had a few long conversations with my mother about the two of us. It weighs heavily on her, and she still dare not raise it with my father; but she realises it’s my life and that no one can or dare cast judgement from the outside.
And: I will never again sleep with Estelle in the double bed. (Here we sleep separately anyway.) I’ve therefore also removed that prickly little matter for you.
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