fanciful devices: Behold the Bread of Angels

A Stone Is Nobody's

A man ambushed a stone. Caught it.
Made it a prisoner.
Put it in a dark room and stood guard over it for the rest of his life.

His mother asked why.

He said, because it's held captive, because it is captured.

Look, the stone is asleep, she said, it does not know whether it's in a garden or not. Eternity and the stone
are mother and daughter; it is you who are getting old. The stone is only sleeping.

But I caught it, mother, it is mine by conquest, he said.

A stone is nobody's, not even its own. It is you who are conquered; you are minding the prisoner, which is yourself,
because you are afraid to go out, she said.

Yes yes, I am afraid, because you have never loved me, he said.

Which is true, because you have always been to me as the stone is to you, she said.

Russell Edson

FAQs

1. Are you a Southeast Asian dancing girl from the 1800s?

No, sorry to disappoint. My avatar and banner images are from an ancient book I found in the depths of my grandmother's cabinets. More on that here.

2. How do you make everything look so old?

First, you need a good oxidizer to brush on every bit of metal you can reach. I'll tell you all about it here.

Then there's this wax. I first mentioned it here. You'll have to scroll down a lot.

3. How can you be so productive?

I'm insanely obsessed and I have no offspring. I do nothing else- I don't have a day job, I don't clean my house or cook, I spend all day in pjs, often completely abandoning personal hygiene... I only interact with other humans when I walk my dog. And I like people! But I prefer dogs.

And I'm sloppy- but I make that sloppiness work for me.

4. Any tips you'd like to share?

No! Except for these 16 posts about techniques and this one about how to find your aesthetic.

5. Would you be offended if I took some inspiration from your designs?

Well, I'd be happier if you outright copied them.

No really, imitation is how we learn. I have enough ideas to go around. And even if I don't- please. No one's going to do this obsessively enough to threaten my business. (Probably.) I learned by copying others and I've seen others copy me as a step toward developing their own voice. So feel free. (I'd love if you tossed me a link in my comments, so I can feel like a proud momma.)

6. What do you look like?

Why, what have you heard? Really? Wow.

The images I promised yesterday.

Ecce Panis Angelorum- behold the bread of angels. Except "ecce"- couldn't that be like in spanish- ese- that one? like "that's angel bread"? Like, "have some angel food cake"? That would rock.

Here it reads Na Sa D Carmen. Our Lady of Carmen.

Now this one below, turns out, is an award for scholarship. It reads on the back Colegio Santa Maria Premio Para Tarea de Vacaciones- Saint Mary Private School Award for Vacation Homework.

And you know it had to be a pretty big deal- that medal couldn't have been cheap to have made. Back in the Stone Age.... On the other hand, it was a ritzy private school. That's what "colegio" means. That's why them freners always say university instead of college. Little lesson for ya.

And God knows you come here to learn.... alternate spellings for foreigners.

And, OK, one might suggest I could have actually looked at the medals and figured this out before making them into a necklace. But where's the intrigue? I just like things for their evocativeness, not their value at some Antiques Roadshow-type gathering. I think of that as the male side of antiques. The when-where-did-it-come-from-what-actually-is-it side. That's my idea of male, lol.