India ink & watercolor on paper

1995 or so (can’t recall exactly when….)

“He had so often read or heard these things said that they did not strike him as original.  Emma was like all of his mistresses, and the charm of novelty, gradually falling away like a garment, laid bare the eternal monotony of passion, that has always the same shape and the same language.  He was unable to see, this so very experienced man, the variety of feeling hidden within the same expressions.  He thought one should beware of exaggerated declarations, as though the abundance of one’s soul did not sometimes overflow with empty metaphors, since no one has ever been able to give the exact measure of his needs or his sorrows.  The human tongue is like a cracked cauldron on which we beat out tunes to set a bear dancing, when we would make the stars weep…..’—Gustave Flaubert; “Madame Bovary”.

The title is taken from a Tori Amos song.  Go to:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqXXwklQ91Q