Rose and scrollwork tattoo design sketch

The customs officer at Halle kept my pencil case for an hour, turning each pencil over as though graphite might be smuggled in its hollow. I told him they were only for roses. He asked which rose, and since I could not answer, I sketched one on the back of his form. He studied it for a long time, then stamped my papers and folded the drawing into his breast pocket. I hope it is still there when you read this.

The scrollwork is the hard part. Herr Wendt at the carriage works says a curl must look wound by a clock and then forgotten. I have spent three weeks on a single sheet for the panel of a hearse, all acanthus and no mourners, with the rose only pencilled in the middle where the lid will sit. He tells me nobody looks at the middle. I keep drawing it anyway, because the middle is the part that has to bloom.

Yesterday the rose went wrong. I shaded the outer petals too early and the curls swallowed them, so I had to rub the graphite back with bread and begin again. The bread left grey crumbs along the edge of the paper, and Wendt swept them away without comment. By evening the petals had opened properly, and I could see the shape of the thing at last, the way a face comes clear once the lamp moves.

Tomorrow I ink the petals. When the dark lines go down, the pencil underneath will vanish, and the rose will look as if it grew there on its own. That is how I want to arrive at the station in March, Ottilie: so finished that no one thinks to ask what was drawn first. Meet me on the platform with your coat open. I will bring the rest of the sketches.