I’m going to keep it real nice and simple. The reason I write the way I do is because I do not do enough talking. I think through these sentences while writing and change words around to make sense of a portrait inside my brain.
Think of my writing as a sweaty window. To most it looks like a sweaty window but the artist may see an old ship on high seas or the face of an angel. They have a different way of seeing the world and with tools and pigments they can show other humans what they see without being on another ship at sea or even believing in angels. They can see the image with their own two eyes without being there and simultaneously be there when an elusive image reveals itself. They can also close their eyes to see the same image after they have it but they can’t paint the image with their eyes closed.
I didn’t know what I was going to see before I sat down to write this post and yet I am able to show other humans what I do see when it comes to sweaty windows.
My style is to explain to a person what I see by pointing it out. You see, here is the mast and here is the sea crashing into the hull making a pattern here (points) that looks like an old man’s wretched palm if he could still open his hand completely and so on.
I can’t paint a sweaty window and I most definitely will not point out the face of an angel because I can’t describe its beauty in as many words as a ship out at sea during a storm.
I can paint about as well as I can speak. The angel is for me to practice my painting. The more I keep the angel in all their beauty to myself the better I feel about seeing it in the first place.
Francis Erich McElroy 