I have lived my life in awe of people who possess talents that allow them to produce pieces of art with a physical presence.
The idea that Michelangelo considered his David to have been encased in excess marble that he simply removed, albeit carefully, is astounding and confounding to my little brain that contorts itself uncomfortably when called upon to reproduce even the most basic of forms in ink or pigment or Play-doh.
Van Gogh, da Vinci, Monet, Hocking … even Jackson Pollock and Stan Lee … accomplish what I can’t begin to begin, and the fact that their images not only endure, but endure while adding so much to the world in such a graceful and accessible form occasionally has me tingeing toward the greenish as I admire their work and covet their genius.
Yes, I do my best to sculpt sentences and paragraphs from a palate of letters and spaces and marks meant to add structure and emphasis, but not even a million blog posts, no matter how brilliantly written, could ever prompt the gasps inspired at even a peek at a corner of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel or one water lily on Monet’s pond.
As a physical manifestation, words are the pale ghosts of art.
As a writer, I’ve often wondered what it would be like to have some of the bonnier of my bon mots literally engraved in stone.
The greatest of writers often have their words transcribed onto impermeable surfaces as testament to their greatness, and as one who pauses to read them when finding such treasures in places where people are meant to gather, to appreciate, to be impressed, I am.
Composers of epitaphs must feel some thrill at knowing their concise summings up of lives and deaths stand for the passing world to see, read and perhaps be touched by even a century after the inspiration for the words has little of their substance left.
Should a time come that someone decides something I’ve written deserves to be posted in a form less ephemeral than cyberspace … less fleeting than a blog, more substantial than an e-book … a form solid and strong and shiny-hard, unlike ink-on-paper, I assume that if I’m in a position to appreciate the effort, I will.
It would be with pride that I would approach such a monument, and I would be overcome by the image of words of my own configuring set in stone for all the passing world to see for generations to come.
Wow. What a moment that would be.
One request, however, way in advance of something that’s not likely to happen in the first place …
please spellcheck before engraving.
(The photos are of a monument in Maurituis. Sigh … )
A collection of my short stories:
I'm in this one, too ...
And I'm in here, as well ...
Paradise Preoccupied 