Painting my face might just become one of my favorite pastimes. Who doesn’t enjoy the liberty colors allow an artist, transforming a blank and plain canvas into beauty, abstraction, and oh so much meaning. One can take a brush and a palette and create an illusion using any part of a human face. Well every part except for one, in my opinion that one body part is the eye.
The eye is a window into the soul of an individual. Growing up my parents used to say, “I know when you are lying by the avoidant look in your eyes.” Truth and emotion are all placed on display in those mystical balls.
The makeup artistry has advanced to such levels of genius so as to distract a random onlooker from gazing into the soul of the model. However, even the greatest of poker faces cannot truly deceive unless the performer masters the eyes’ multi-faceted language and all of its manipulations.
In my short lifespan there have been few sets of eyes to have captured my heart’s core.
The first pair of eyes to ever demand my curiosity, majestic reverence manifested in light of the mystic surrounding those eyes, displayed a struggle, a vicious tug of war between intense pain and harsh indifference. An interested analyst could sense the volumes of instances then desperate cries had been ignored and instead a cold lesson in apathy was taught. The tiny, naked, black and blue, teary-eyed little girl would learn the proper way to paint her face.
Art had concealed her fear for years. In her talent she was proud. No one would ever look past the mask; no one would ever penetrate her heart. How was she to know that one day a group of people would come to her? A group made up of colors vastly different than her own. A group of individuals, who understood this artistry, yet had the magical powers to see past its lies. How was she to know, that random somebody from a foreign land would have the ability to look into her soul and offer her the one thing she never allowed herself to want, Love.
Another pair of eyes radiating sadness, fear, and anger finally commencing a journey of healing. These are the eyes that haunt me. For these eyes, I give the life in mine.
