We may not be able to tell exactly what is wrong, but there is always the something. We can’t think properly, life is gone, we are weeping, or we want to, even in the happiest moments there is that black dog, that wrong feeling.
It is the esbat of the dark moon, and tonight I offer up juice and alcohol, salt and water and incense at the altar of the spirits. I remember the spirits of this house and of the earth. Everything has a spirit, all spirits ought to be served, especially those who cannot serve themselves, or those it is our responsibility to serve. Perhaps for a storyteller the chief spirits to be served are those of our characters. They are given to us and no one else, to be fostered. Sing to them, talk to them, burn incense for them, cajole them, be them, see them.
The other day I went to the beach. We went. It was cool because spring is late in getting here, and the beach was nearly empty in the first few days of May. I remember years before I used to go the beach with someone else and there were so many people. I would look at the people. There was this one boy, maybe thirteen, with bright blue eyes in a pale face. He wasn’t handsome, really, but he was stunning. His knees were drawn to his chest, and he had dark hair plastered to his head. He became Roy Cane, and in a way Ian. He became a template for the men of the Cane family. The way when h

Lysias

Titian has a painting titled The Flaying of Lysias. The story: the satyr Lysias challenges the god Apollo to a contest of the arts, whoever wins is allowed to flay the other. Lysias, challenging the gods, that is to say, going beyond himself loses, and he is being flayed in the painting, all of his skin exposed, Apollo gently takes off his flesh, almost lovingly.

In Michelangelo's painting of the Last Judgment, Saitn Bartholomew rides up to Christ. Bartholomew who himself was flayed alive. He is holding up his skin, but anyone who knows art a little realizes that this empty flesh, the flayed flesh in not that of Bartholomew, but of Michelangelo. It is his grey, stripped face, his stonemason's body represented in the hanging skin.

So this is a theme in art. Here is a question for the artist to ask: I ask it myself. Around this question comes many, many troubling revelations which assault our assumption about success. Most of the people we will ever meet are fully prepared to be mediocre. If you would succeed at all times you can only do that which you are sure of doing flawlessly.

But now so the artist. We must always go beyond ourselves and in a way. Whether we hold up the flesh to Christ, or are flayed by Apollo, we always challenge the God within, we always respond to that call, and in some way, we always lose. So winning is not really the question. The question the consummate artists must ask is this: have I offered myself up? Have I gone beyond and ripped off the skin? Have I been merciless on myself and gone into myself? Surely this is the only way. Have I been flayed?

Believe it or not, the only answer that brings peace and rest is, "yes."