semjaza

O.K. First, thanks for all the nice comments on my last enrty . Some of you have asked about the novel I'm working on so here's an excerpt. I hope you enjoy it .

Dorian sat on the floor of his studio and starred catatonically at the wall. His mind was blank for a long while and then a voice iterrupted the silence. "Don't you ever paint anything happy?" It was her voice of course, he seldom heard anyone else's. How long ago had she asked him that question, he couldn't remember. A week? A month? Six years? It seemed like forever even if it was yesterday. An hour seemed like a lifetime and he had lived an eternity in a day. Countless eternities had passed him by, or did he pass them? Day upon day upon day, an endless string of eternities and it was only Thursday and he was only thirty-three.

How long would it last? How much longer could he go on? He looked around the studio, which in his mind resembled a desert, and shuddered as he felt that horrific feeling yet again. The one that made him think he had achieved everything he could and there was nothing left. His paintings covered the walls randomly like splotches of paint covering poorly repaired holes in the plaster. This was his art, his life. "Don't you ever paint anything happy?" It seemed to echo throughout the large room and Dorian looked around convinced the speaker was there with him. "No!" he snapped back at the emptiness, but it wasn't the room that was empty, it was him. Dorian realized that he had been obsessed with getting what he wanted for so long that he had lost track of what that was. Try as he might he couldn't clear the shadows in his mind long enough to cast his consciousness back and retrieve the answer to his question.

"What do I want?" He mused. "Why do I still breath?" Why indeed? Why does anyone keep breathing when they've experienced enough to know better? "Why don't you paint anything happy?" Why was her voice still there? After all, she was long gone. But her voice remained, a constant reminder, like a poorly healed scar. "I don't paint anything happy," he began, speaking to the emptiness. "I don't paint anything happy because that would be a fraud." He felt she was not satisfied. "In order to honestly capture an emotion in art," he continued. "One must first experience that emotion in life. and I for one do not care to fake it." This did seem to satisfy her restlessness and he was finally able to re-focus his attention, but on what?

Dorian starred at the canvas and agonized over it's blankness. He never planned his paintings, but rather let them flow from him like blood. When they were done, he was spent. He imagined the feeling must mirror that of childbirth. He had never actually given birth, but that's how he imagined it would feel. Exhausting, satisfying, lonely and confusing. Why did humans constantly feel the need to second-guess everything? Even the most natural acts, such as procreation, were cause for speculation. He would over-think his creations until they lost all meaning. They were only real to him if they were reflected in someone elses eyes. But there were no more eyes to read the reflections in. Everyone he trusted was gone and he had a sneaking suspicion that he had driven them all away. But why?

Sorry if there are typos.