Everything as you like, from here on out.

"You just try to buy me into giving you something." She said he never gave her anything worth having. "I want your everything as long as its free."
And then she left.
And then he broke things, because it was the next best thing to breaking himself, which wasn't a thing he had learned how to do.
Because it isn't a thing you learn how to do alone.
Is it? Hm. I misspoke. I misspeak. All the time.

"All of you who are speaking right now...are failing. So those of you who've remained silent...should fail more."
But there is more than one way to speak; to purge; to reverse. But then, I suspect I am only saying this to defend myself. But then, I am defending reluctance, only, not silence altogether.


"The collector is possessive....beyond all else he is collecting himself." (122)
And this is what Cane does--to his money, to artifacts, and to the people around him. And in those pretty mirrors behind him.
To collect is to say "I do not want this to be lost." But to collect is also to say "this can be lost." And if it can be, it likely will be; if not in the whole wide world, then in the ever growing collection of the collector; if not by silence, then by noise.

But if not by noise, then by silence: one night, a painter has a magnificent dream. Firebird and foxes and all that lovely shit. At 4am, before the sun has come up, he wakes with these images fresh in his mind, throws himself out of bed to crouch over his easel like a big, bald bird. He mixes colors until noon, striking oranges through reds--because that is the color of a firebird, yes?--he mumbles anxiously to himself. But the red isn't right; it is never right. At half past noon, he has gone through an entire tube of crimson. Perhaps sometime that evening, he holds a loaded brush before the canvas--but throws it away. That night, he throws all of his paints away. He will not paint, because he know he cannot paint what he dreamt as he dreamt it. He has more dreams, amazing and brilliant and beautiful. A couple times, he tries to paint them; but he never does. He never paints again--just sits in his bed after he wakes, tongue fidgeting between parted lips as he keeps his eyes shut as long as he can.
Twelve years later, the painter would like to remember the color of his firebird. But he cannot. Frustrated, he picks up his paintbrush and tries to paint it--but to his horror, his skill has left him--his firebird looks like a child's scribbling. He falls to his knees and weeps, for he now has neither the memory nor the means to retrieve it.

I do not have answers; I do not even have questions. I just....I want to mumble, and be mumbled against.




...Ok, one more picture (and a dashing one at that) of Mr. Welles.





















8D