the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands]
A free translation. Nice? Stow myself in the word and especially in your Stroomgebied. But it’s difficult for me to write you know how tough the going is. And then still a bit pro amico and half devil-may-care. While I believe in the heart of the flower. And why in the name of God were we created so similar? Have I asked you that before? What do you hear from Chris [Barnard] – are they still dying of hunger and motor cars and Paris? I still see Chris Lombard sometimes and he also sometimes asks after his boy. El. is alone again and W. happily settled with family; they live in a big piece of glass and over weekends they go to Lanzerac. The theatre here is dead and I don’t want to suffer through Vergelegen. May and Jonty [Driver] are in Roeland Street or Wynberg. (Driver the poet.) Is that now enough news for you, little heart? Because at the moment I can think of nothing else. Opperman asked for “Die Kind” and “Swanger Vrou” [“Pregnant Woman”] for Groot Verseboek and I suppose I must write to Bartho now to give permission. Uys is still in Johannesburg and Jack is living alone in his seaside house like the lord of life. I feel sad about him. He even let the servant go and pulled out the phone and locks all his doors. Mostly. I wish the sun would come now. The other day I went for a swim with the children with the same old joy. And climbed Table Mountain all the way to the top.
As always,
Cocoon.
204 Bonne Esperance
Beach Road
Sea Point
Thursday, 17 September 1964
My dearest André,
This very day I have written your name so often, on the foreheads of my friends … But they were also absent! Thank you for your beautiful yellow suns which will make the night bright morning; I’m already impatient to get into bed with them! In an undetectable manner … I thought about you so much today, or rather, felt such a part of you. During the lunch hour I went to visit Anne at Citadel and while she was elsewhere occupied I sat in our cage and god! felt the snows of yesteryear falling upon me again! Now I work in a neat office and everyone addresses me formally and I can now see why the Dutch think we are so courteous! Tell your learned German friend that I am very glad he likes my poems and that he’s sure to translate them and please give him my address. Tell him also that I have a publisher in Germany, Berlin, that is very interested in publishing Rook en Oker, and that “Die Kind” has already been translated into German by Peter Sulzer and is appearing in a German anthology. Tell him also that I cared (and still care) deeply about Berlin, and have several invitations to come and stay there for as long as I wish.
Dear man, it is “nieuwe griffels schone leien” for us. And it is precisely we who can now do so little for one another. While we just had to … you know, say goodbye, and how! Rather, let me try to be practical. Have I described the new flat to you? Blue curtains, “the colour of absence”. If I had my tape recorder here now I would rather have chatted to you, but Chris [Lombard] borrowed it. And all my own furniture, for a change. I’ll soon have a phone too; and I must speak to you about Orgie. I have this beautiful thing’s bromides here and Freda’s coming on Monday to chat about them. I’m worried that a libel action might be brought against us and I must get an opinion; my respectable father is not going to be impressed with it and nor will my sister or my sister or brother. Even less my step! Or am I seeing ghosts because I myself sometimes – feel – so – desolate? I can no longer think clearly. Fears barge in everywhere. I need you André, but just forget it …
Further: had a few friends here yesterday, including the Stranger [Jack], who does everything for me so coolly and quietly, makes little tables and tall lamp stands, and goes away … God! if only I had patience for this black life! A picnic with Barnie [Barend] Toerien and his “girlfriend” and the Stranger at windswept desolate Noordhoek, read Dutch poetry round the fire, and then each one disappears, quietly, alone, for long lonely walks …
A new friend, Mr E. Middlemiss, from Rondevlei Bird Sanctuary, praise god! (Husband of the English poet Tania van Zyl.)
Your 90 Days sounds helluva interesting. Send the MS as you write and don’t you lose confidence too, now! One of us is enough!
Paris … Paris … Paris … Every gesture, every word, every caress, every sigh is so bright, blinding. When, that first night, you fell asleep in my arms, tired and content, at the Seine, and said “My treasure …”; didn’t I realise then already? That we will never truly be free of one another.
And I thank you gratefully, and I greet you, yours as you touched me, in Barcelona –
Your Cocoon.
204 Bonne Esperance,
Beach Road
Sea Point
Thursday, 24 September 1964
My dearest yellow-and-purple penguin doll,
Thank you for all the telegrams and the banknotes (that fell out of the yellow nightie and which the servant later picked up and put on my agenda) and with which I bought a white bikini with little frills and a white-and-red blouse with little frills that hang from the top down the middle. And the irises (why are you grieving?) and the daffodils and carnations that again arrived at such a critical time when the world’s gossipmongers were congregating at Bonne Separance. Freda brought me three cups of wine and Jack made a lamp and a little table and an adult tea set (bought) and Marjorie and Jan gave me Etienne’s new book and two watercolours. Too beautiful. So you see how spoilt I am. Was just dead scared of Uys whom I’ve not yet seen (he arrived back yesterday and if he hears about – he probably already has – the Paris-Barcelona-business he’ll eat me alive). I phoned him and he sounded perfectly friendly and excited about himself so I hope it carries on like that. He’ll definitely be disappointed, at least because I returned so quickly to this lot. About you I will say no comment if I can.
Tomorrow evening there’s a party at Bakoven for Marjorie’s birthday and all the Cape Circle Artists will be present so you can imagine how much gossip there’ll be. And you, lief-ste-tjie, how are you holidaying? On Saturday we were at the Darling show (veld flowers) and then Barend Toerien’s car went and broke down and we had to be scandalously towed back to town and spent the rest of the day there buggering around in the veld among the flowers and things. Afterwards, like a crushed veld flower myself, I fell into bed and slept for ten solid hours. You should see the new flat. Living in the centre of a highly polished saucer. Shiny and clean. Shiny and clean like life should be and sometimes actually is, in these half-spring days. But what can equal that Tuesday morning in Paris? It’s actually terrible, the way I carry the Paris days around with me and “the sun in my eyes now forever covered / with black butterflies”. End of my most recent poem.
Sorry that I’m typing this letter, but I’ve wanted to write to you from home every night since Saturday and every evening people come around and stay till late. So now I’m writing quickly during work hours, and my dear little boy, I’m probably not even telling much. There is, in any case, so little news since I last wrote to you – everything is just the same. Tonight Freda’s coming and then we’re going to discuss Orgie. (On Monday night she was there with Anne Fischer, nice person.) I hardly ever go out at night because of Simone and the servant lives too far away to stay in. Probably better that way because sometimes I feel too wild to be let loose and I walk around the flat like a caged and wounded animal. Frustrated, my boy. Can it carry on like this? And you?
On Wednesday afternoons I run to my class. The psychiatrist says goo-goo. French I’ll have to learn from the beginning again because while I was doctoring (just after I got back) I was “on call” in the evenings and fell behind. Still can’t see when I’ll go to Paris, but I WILL. And I WILL need money! I think about you lots these radiant thoughts and memories and wonder how strangely you live there so far away.
Much love for you,
Always,
Cocoon.
COCOON FROM BARCELONA.
Grahamstown
Thur
sday, 1 October 1964
Darling Cocoon, my most special one, my very own,
Thank you for your two precious letters – one of them has only just arrived, via Potchefstroom. I’m already feeling cornered, there’s not a second to write in peace, especially during a vacation week. I had a “social” holiday – addressed the Women’s Association in Klerksdorp and the students in Potch. This last event was a fantastic encounter – first the audience was hellishly antagonistic, along with questions based on Biblical texts, followed by an ovation, with incredible enthusiasm. The Enlightenment arrives in the Transvaal?! (Rather presumptuous, hey!)
Bought a new car. Had to, as the old one suddenly gave up the ghost. With all its memories: Hout Bay, Gordon’s Bay, Franschhoek, Stellenbosch, Green Point – Green Point. And that first Sunday morning, driving back from Bantry Bay. Everything, however, moves forward. Yet the heart remains, it lingers. My darling, my dazzling thing: without you my days are empty, all monotone. At night I sleep in my study, among many books, alone. Roaming, role-play, often unconcealed venom.
In ten days’ time (Tuesday 13th until Friday 16th) it’s off to Johannesburg for The Ambassador. Alone. I suddenly began to wonder – madness, I know – if you couldn’t, perhaps? To sleep, to sleep, perchance to dream.
You’re really funny: how would notes have fallen out of your parcel when I sent you a cheque? God is a god of surprises. How do you look in your pale-yellow piece, my chick-with-the-kontjie? And the white bikini. And you. It’s cold and wet and miserable here. Summer won’t be coming back in a hurry. But my heart, full of compassion and admiration, carries memories of Paris, of Montmartre, of the sun on the Seine.
I’m struggling with 90 Dae. Should the main character be coloured? I hope to finish it off this summer. And the book about Spain that I’m not looking forward to at all because the memories are so impersonal. And just a little youth thing for John Malherbe.
Don’t be worried about Orgie! It’s impossible for anyone to recognise your father: in the story he isn’t even married to the girl (I can make it more explicit if you like), and she was his only child; I’ll shift the country town, with river and all, to the coast. I want John to release it on 29 May. As I turn 30. Let us fuck and cry and be human. Tomorrow a new decade begins.
Please send me your new poem with its beautiful closing lines. One of these days you’ll have a new volume of poems. Next week, with the third-years, I’ll be doing Ingrid Jonker. And my heart dare not break.
Don’t take too long with French, with Paris.
A silly girl in Uys’s Twaalfde Nag [translation of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night] (a female prompt) writes extremely embarrassing letters – about how she takes a photo of me with her to the bathroom, etc. Why can’t you and I take a bath again, standing in the heavy rain of grace?
You are so lovely: and you fill my eyes “with light and restlessness”. Love, always,
Ever your André.
Friday, 9 October 1964
AIR COACH SABOTAGING US STOP CONGRATULATIONS PUBLICATION THE AMBASSADOR LOVE = COCOON
Sea Point
Friday, 16 October 1964
My dearest André,
Where is your letter that follows the mysterious telegram? I did in fact receive a beautiful letter from you and thanks a lot for that, but it’s this one that was written last Thursday before my telegram: you ask (stupid) whether I can’t come up to Grahamstown with John [Malherbe]: but how is that possible if you’re working? Remember the Cape Divisional Council, 6 Dorp Street, as translator, with a group of prim people; and your week in Johannesburg I’ll be working too: are you serious? And what did you “ask me last time” that I must remember? Dearest little hell!
No. I don’t think you should swop around the two roles: X and he. You wouldn’t be able to swop the roles of the ambassador and Stephen. Why is this possible in Orgie? So do you see, my pet, you must still work on the role that “he” plays. One doesn’t really ever gain sympathy for him, even less so for X, but I want you to round them off a little and certainly to bring him even more into the foreground. Let me count your moesies again! Let me hold you in my arms again, heavy and tired, like in Paris, that first night. This is how you’ll enable him to gain more form: remember “Where will I hide from the speckles that peck?”
We’re already touching summer here: even have a tan already: took Simone to the bioscope this afternoon to see the hateful Elvis Presley, who she’s crazy about.
Jack and Jan went mountain-climbing for ten days – left Wednesday but came back Thursday: the weather was apparently terrible, and they tried to sleep exposed out in the rain on Wednesday night. Last night Jack came to visit, everything is still just as static between us: I fell asleep around nine o’clock and when I woke at four this morning he’d clearly been gone for ages already.
I’ll probably go to Paris early next year: would have left by now already but Simone … Further child, I am so hungry for love and sex – this is probably the longest chaste period for years! What is one to do? Take portraits to the bath! I am not satisfied with just “remembrance, oh beautiful ship” and want to be right in it where life throbs. I don’t even fight any more! Why are you sleeping in the study with its knobbly bed? I wish you would tell me everything! I’d love to come to you in Jhb. Even just for a weekend, but – I am AFRAID. You’re probably just as scared, “André”. A thing like Barcelona must never be allowed to happen to us again – I wouldn’t be able to take it. I saw your beloved portrait in the newspaper the other day about the cute “Koekoek [in Ons Nes]” [“Cuckoo in Our Nest”]. You make it quite hard to forget you! Your dream about you and Jack is quite realistic especially if you take into consideration that I have now applied for a .22 revolver, and the darkness. Maybe I’ll never use it, because of Simone, and you and Jack. Paris is perhaps a much better answer.
My little lamb, I have no news and no words.
Have you seen the latest Contrast with my “Wiegelied vir die Beminde” – André, why were you so close again today, is it your “evil genius”? God! I miss you! After your open, fearless fervour, your eternal chastity, your fiery submission. I miss your body, and your entire death, and your youth beyond words.
Your Cocoon.
204 Bonne Esperance
Beach Road
Three Anchor Bay
Monday, 9 November 1964
My dearest André,
Thank you for your lekker long fat letter: which upset me for more than one reason – the “Thursday night” is resolved – don’t you know, everything sounds worse long range. And when I called you I’d been particularly down that day. Surely you forgive me? I’ve tried so often to write to you, but words are insufficient, my darling boy. And how must I write now? In a kind of general direction … every now and again I notice with a shock your beloved face in one of the newspapers; yesterday in the Sunday Times too and a while ago about the “Koekoek in Ons Nes” which has drawn much attention in Cape Town. I am so glad you had a good time in Johannesburg and that you met Stephen [Etienne Leroux] – he’s a lovely guy, I wish he’d come and farm in the Cape, he’s cut off from the people he wants to write about and it says much about him as an artist that he can apply himself, solitary as he is the Free State, so seriously … ag God, that sounds rubbishy. Was Renée [le Roux] also there? Anyway, Stephen is sympathetic. Maybe his politics are a little off the mark, like Bartho’s …
Yesterday morning Jan and Marjorie arrived here and unexpectedly invited us for lunch. Cosy, reading newspapers and listening to music and I got Jan’s book: Die Groot Anders-maak: For Ingrid of the Coast from Jan of the Cape. We’ve got horrible weather here, and you? We also had a thunderstorm during the news of poor [John] Harris – I am deeply upset about all these matters – the liberals are generally seen in a bad light, especially the ones who betrayed their friends.
Darling I read The Ambassador again. On Saturday night, with Simone sleeping in my arms. It’s a new experience again in English and beautifu
lly translated – you mustn’t say “soothingly” so often. You never say “comforted” but always “soothed”. And for me it’s a slippery word. I noted quite a number of little things I hadn’t seen before, probably because we visited all the places and people in Paris. Everything is so rounded off. My neatest little one. Do you think you could exploit that wonderful Keyter–Van Heerden situation more fully? Or would it be too dramatic then? Where did you find the name Keyter?
I also want to write a story about something that I’ve dreamt. I dreamt I am in love with a beautiful horse with a red mane, but at the end of the dream I discover he is married – to another girl. He tosses his mane around and the little brown girl in the white dress leads him away …
Further, child, further. Still building little towers and roads and translating the dullest, most innoffensive lot of reports. Amazed, I listen every day to the lives of the bourgeoisie. Lord, but they are self-satisfied … and pathetic. They call me a Sekstiger. Speaking of Sestig, don’t let the thing die now. What is it with you? What have we achieved? It’s only just begun. Jan thinks just as I do. We’ll have to have a council meeting! Convey this to Jan, or John Malherbe.
Oh yes, another reason I was unsettled by your letter – you sound so desperate. Is it really so bad, my treasure …? I “more or less firmly” decided that Jack and I cannot go on, not as “friends” and not on any of his terms. It’s a difficult decision, we’ve known one another so long, our whole situation is a way of life.
But God, even if I go through the valley of the shadow of death … definitely no further, not like this. It is in any case never further, it’s a painful withdrawal. I am so deeply indebted there that I’ll never get out of it. Why did I pursue him with such aggressive energy? But it’s a dreary subject.
I call out to you, my little prince. Do you know, I have a maid who cooks wonderfully, you’ll never get fried eggs again! I’m fatter already. People say I look “radiant”. God!
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