Bjorka Glasbruk, Fri eve 5 July 1968
Lingering over tea in the comfortable fire lit downstairs sitting room – Swedish twilight and mosquitoes crawling at the windows. There are a couple of mattresses but most people sit on the floor. Three worn chairs around a table loaded with mismatched crockery – the remains of Swedish “tea”. Hard (uneatable) bread and spoons sticky with jam. (The jam is very good and most people can eat it from the jar.) Two Polish boys have just arrived and are being quizzed in halting German. Tired but content I am reading HG Wells’ The New Machiavelli - our lives are castles built on cards of chance. What an excellent film it would make – leaving out of course the early life and the lengthy dissertations on Victorian politics. The selfishly random selection of mates – how many boys have I dated without really knowing them? At what point does pride become self-destruction??? Isabel is the best of the book – seen through Remington’s eyes she is hard to understand but comprehension may not be necessary. Paolo “Of the Rose” (he says that’s his last name) insists on signing my book. “Where lies love? Here lies love” he writes in painfully awkward calligraphy. When he finds out I am interested in film he shows me the business card of his brother, who is a “metteur en scène” in Paris. Toss might as well be here I am so inextricably bound to that body, that smile. No calls to “freedom” can tempt me to injure myself with my own chains. Probably when I finally manage to convince Toss that I love him, he will leave me. Two weeks from tomorrow I will be in his arms. We will have been separated only five weeks. I like the international atmosphere of this place. Bjorka Glasbruk, Sat 6 July 1968 Watch my hands cleaning potatoes as if they belong to someone else. Full of character, if a little crooked. There’s a dance tonight. I was not going to go, but Paolo Of the Rose said very calmly that if I did not go he would kill himself. He is tremendously attractive in an animal way. Long, wavy black Jesus hair (often a purple paper flower behind one ear; several bead necklaces against his naked chest.) He calls me ‘Philadelphia”. Sometimes he wears a battered leather jacket – leather against naked skin is definitely sensually exciting. Noticing I read all the time he brought me a copy of DH Lawrence’s Plumed Serpent. I said I was “engaged” to “an American photographer” but Paolo is unimpressed. No one is as great a lover as he is. He makes converts, not conquests. Poor Alysse! He doesn’t seem to have a nationality – speaks French and Italian fluently and English passably – is not a student but an employee of this place. He says he is a Catholic and a communist. When I asked if the two were compatible he very honestly said “No.” He has very smoky, burning eyes. Impossible to say whether he really has a “pash” for me or is just being Italian. He is both a pleasure and the bane of my existence. I take a break from him with Norwegian John, who is intense but cheerful, open and friendly all the time. Never threatens to kill himself. John makes fun of my dreamy expression, absent-mindedness and reading at the table. Calls me La Giaconda. He did try to kiss me but when I dodged accepted it gracefully. DH Lawrence is a verbose madman, alas. He has the most deathly set of interlocking neuroses imaginable. The minds of women are absolute closed book to him and it makes him so annoyed. Never has phallus worship risen to such heights. Men are columns of blood, women are valleys of blood. Such fun! Spent my morning working in the kitchen (everyone had a half day off.) Washed up for six meals, cooked for four. I like chef Ola, he has a very sweet sense of humor. We did produce a very good liver stew if I do say so myself. The rest of the time I’m painting or puttying the ramshackle house next door. I ACHE for Toss’ letters. When he picked me up at nasty old Senescence Manor (to qualify for my own graduation trip) and we were driving in the darkness I asked his profile, “What are you thinking?” and he answered, “I love Alysse Aallyn.” Sigh. We hang together so well, Tom & I. I hope he knows it. He took me to his backyard chalet to hide me from his father – behind the bronze cherubs and the might-be Matisse. Not that it worked. His father was cool. We all went swimming together. Bjorka Glasbruk, Mon eve 8 July 1968. Stage is prose and film is poetry – I reached that conclusion today hanging outside a second storey window on a sling. The whole time I’m painting I picture myself sitting in a black room before a sheet of virgin paper. And a cold July it is! I didn’t think I’d make it through today – shivering and covered in paint. I definitely should not be attracted to Rex Entwistle (English Boy) but freezing to death without an easy doubling of body heat is making things more difficult. He’s a charmer! Plus that accent! He makes such delicious fun of Paolo who literally has no comeback but smokes like an inefficient fireplace. Letters from Toss (finally) but they are torturous as he attends the Party Scene (“I have no patience for these silly games after knowing you.”) Leaves me very, very weak. Off in the lorry to Kalmar.
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Alysse Aallyn
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