Less is More
"Oh, this is awful," I say, covering my eyes.
The Calligrapher looks over my shoulder, then takes the paper away from me. "Well," he says, and stops.
"Just say it, it's awful."
His ears flick sideways. Then he says, "It is an irony."
I eye him, glum. "What. That the word means "best when smaller" and I've gone and made it this gaudy, overblown thing? It's not even pretty-overblown. It's just... ugly."
He gives me a new sheet. "You are trying to paint words the way I do. Calligraphy comes from within, aunerai. Paint your own mind."
"Fine," I mutter, taking the T-square again. I am going to get this piece of calligraphy done for the bookmarks I'm sending to reviewers, I swear. I settle down to paint, and a slim, spindly line wobbles from my ragged old brush.
"That's good," he says, startling me. "Keep going."
So I do. And the end is long and thin, kind of like naked twigs in winter.
"That," the Calligrapher says, arresting my painting hand by setting his hand just above my elbow, but without touching. "Leave it so. Don't embellish."
"Just like that?"
"Like that," he said. "That is calligraphy. And it is the substance of ikirim. Yes? Understated."
"Right," I say, and put it aside to dry.
Stardancer Home.
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haikujaguar) wrote,
