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Aleister Crowley Diary Entry Thursday, 10 June 1920
5.45 a.m. (Chapter I. The Body-snatchers grab Sir Roger's diary: an excerpt, brought in at this point to encourage my typist.)
Have been up all night writing 'Moon-wane', and 'Love's Middle Age'. There's something nearer song in 'Moon-wane'. I wish not only to write faery bards forlorn stuff, but something sizeable again. Not merely Adonis, but Mortadello. I don't see how it's to be done unless I get a house all alone. (Oh, poet, poet, poet.) I wanted Leah [Leah Hirsig] to be a fire-breathing dragon, and a Dog of Evil, and a Dog-faced Demon, and a Rudolf Steiner's Countess, and a surly Janitor, and a Bodyguard, and a Maxim Silencer, and a Barrage, and an Isle-encircling Sea, and a moat defensive to an house, and a calthrop, and a front-line trench, and an area railing and a cow-catcher, and a tortoiseshell, and a macintosh, and an American Letter, and a rhinoceros-hide, and an unbreakable Eggshell, and a Hun pill-box, and an anti-aircraft corps, and a porcupine skin, and a nutshell; and the nearest she gets to it is being a nut.
Moreover, I wanted her to be an Egeria, and a Mentor, and a Calliope, and a Dr Warre, and a Venus in Furs, and an Elder Cato, and a Marsyas, and a Socrates, and a Lictor, and a Mr Squeers, and a Catherine II, and a Dr Bircham, and a Saint Urticaria, and a Colonel Wackham, and a Miss Fanny Goosem, and a severer Seneca, and a Swedish Masseuse, and a Miss Tickler and a fashionable school-mistress, and a Lady Fanny Lashem, and a female deity of Colonel Gormley, and a Crowleiomastix, and a Priest of Alys, and a Jesus Christ among the money-changers, and a whipper-snapper, and a Marquis de Sade, and an Ethel Yoshiwara (a dear old friend of mine) and a Tiberius, and a Caligula, and a Nero; but her best attempt has been to be an heroine. (A Nero-ine; joke!)
Note—presumably by Leah—Oh, poet, poet, poet, you could have said it all in one compound-word—'Lightning rod'.
Observe the abyss of my shame: a Pun! All her fault. I wanted her to be a Tyler, armed with a lethal weapon, to keep off intruders; that was the first bit. And the last bit; I wanted her to keep me with my nose to the grindstone, and even to protect my health; for I need discipline, and seem too lazy to apply it myself. I can't persuade myself to take myself seriously; that seems to be the trouble. Dolce far niente; manana; tomorrow is also a day; procrastination is the soul of business; don't do it now; when the sky falls we shall all catch larks; non-action leads to Moksha; Doing is a deadly thing, ends in death; accomplish everything by doing nothing—hang it! I'm beginning to convince myself that I'm a noble fellow to slack about in pyjamas all day, too lazy even to perform the simplest acts of courtesy to ladies, charming ladies, who only need a little tongue to go with the ham to be perfectly happy, not even so much as craving sausage with their eggs (Oeufs Bercy) or a yard added to their 'ell, or to have the President of the Royal Institute of Christian Knowledge address the Cefalu United Thought Society.
Yes, I'm becoming a Quietist, almost (and I may venture another paranomasia, play 'po' words) a Molly-Coddle-ist. I am a missed stick, placid as a Nescio-quid-pro-Qua-ker, my love as passive as an inhabitant of Lower Boehme, my water unagitated by Soaper-and-Tauler, my record blank as the canvas and the colon of Jan-Van-Eyck-after-taking-salts-and-sen-na-nist, my dawn-meditation, worthy of a Di-Plo-ma-ta-tius, my silence kin to stri-Porphyry, my Hood drawn down deep as Mrs Where-did-you-get-that-' Atwood, my lamp short of oil as never trade-on-sp-Li-von-tick-and-Esk;—'arts'—hans-en-ny-where. Carried, my methods of finance, sounder than those of an 'I-g-amblic-cuss. Ah me! I fear that I shall read nought Comi-Chal-Pan-dean in the Oracles but that I am booked for Zoroandisaster.
And after that I deserve it!
Alostrael [Leah Hirsig], beloved, even in enteritis, or exit-wrongis (this is a habit like love, and nearly as bad), even in hysteria, or low-steer-yer, or Hearst-Era, even in exhibitions of Freudianism, even in moments of anti-Shummytism [Ninette Shumway], in dreams of that Jelly-hussy, when you want to say 'That stric' Ninette ate strychnine; I this trick, Ninette; my knee nettles your solar plexus; I guess you won't come back to vexus', even when you give me a pain in the place where J. W. Morrice has his, beloved, Alostrael, I love you; and I implore you urgently to do these two things.
First: Everybody to keep off the grass Put railings round me and let no one pass Fermez Ire's fermement en fer le passage![1]
Second: Be strict with me; no longer twenty, I can't afford much dolce far niente. Make me work two hours every mortal morning, And whack me, after one emphatic warning. If I don't do it; keep me off the drink, Make me bathe daily, lest I come to stink; Two hours of walking, or of Football Fives, Should hold our health, and stretch our youth and lives; Save me moreover from becoming sick By thrice a day Quinine with Arsenic. Put me to bed at sunset, ere light flies Don't let me use a lamp, and hurt my eyes. Don't let Ninette with French love or with Greek Seduce me more than once or twice a week. Remember, this means you as well, I'll fall From grace, not more than thrice a week in all. I'd rather be well flogged with knouts and cactuses, But—make me polish up my Yoga practices. Then, to the edification of beholders, Make me draw, let's say 50 arms and shoulders; Until your sparring partner murmurs 'Pretty', Forbid me to presume to draw a titty; But then, two-score-five brace; and if they strike us As good, I'll venture on the umbilicus; Then, undisturbed if my way's even tenor is, I'd like to have a shot at the Mons Veneris, Success with which, I trust, confers a right! To shoot at any prowling cat on sight ... Ah! castles in the air! Well! collect 'em By following the motto 'Probe rectum'. Then when you know exactly where I stand Sing your best-song 'Das Schweitzer Hinterland' The Upright Man, though bald and pink his poll, Who analyses to the bottom the Whole, The fundamental Whole, may hope to spend Life rapturously, and earn a grateful End. Should your next lover ask 'Your last still dear is?' 'Circumspice, si monumentum quaeris',[2] You should reply, and, teasing, add 'Mon coco, Dulce nonne est desipere in hoc loco'[3] But I digress, If you enforce these rules On this menagerie of brats and fools, Myself the Sun whose rays with chaste effulgence Pleads with offended Deity for indulgence. This Paree ala Freud of drones and dastards, Stale Backfisch, rotten governesses' bastards, Whores, a la Henna, on smutty stories gloating, Drink-drowned, till there's but one poor kidney floating With fingers fortified for Football Fives By the chief occupation of their lives So trained to management of tongue and lip Their kisses would rot the mainmast of a ship. So in well-doing exercised, nor weary, One should have gone with Scott, and one with Peary! But stay!!! the question yet more deeply probe!— We might have lost the axis of the globe, Their infants, barely weaned, already headed For those greased chutes whence once they squalling sledded, 'Mother' (he seeks his infantile Valhalla) 'Mayn't I kiss yours as I kissed Mamalala's?' The other (at two) mere incest a has been is 'Shummy, won't you suck my nice little penis?' If you, Alostrael, beloved, enforce Sanely and simply the aforesaid course In this asylum-brothel-water-closet You'll need no 'next-boy', but proceed, deposit Bisexual bastards as you chance to breed 'em, And Jesus only knows how we shall feed 'em!
Slept all day.
1—['Close fast the passage with iron.'] 2—['Look around, if you are seeking a memorial.'] 3—['Sweetie, isn't it nice to have fun here?']
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