There once was a master sculptor from Thebes. This artist had worked his entire life to hone his craft. Day in and day out he would labour in his demanding work, giving his life to details. He put his entire soul into each cut, and each blow from his hammer was as a beat of his heart, so in tune with his work was he. His name was Polyamoris.
He produced many fine masterpieces, and he became quite famous throughout all of Greece. His works adorned the halls of kings, and queens came from far and wide to admire, and of course, to purchase, his beautiful creations. He mostly carved the human figure, blossoming in the full resplendence of youth. He did not love these creations solely for their superficial beauty, but also because of what they promised. Suitors to his statues knew that they spoke of the dream of ambition and yet-to-be-realized potential.
And yet for all of his notoriety, not to speak of fortune, this sculptor began to grow lonesome. For the greater beauty he realized in his creations, the further in humanity it seemed to shrink from him. He saw those who loved his work, whom he passed on the street. They thought only of the statues while they looked at them. They interpreted the beauty as only applying to the statues themselves. The promises they saw rested only in marble and stone. And, he knew, sooner or later, the people would walk away from his works, and they would go about their lives, but they would forget the wisdom they had almost gleaned from the statues. People would operate as they always had, as they saw others about them operating, the ways that they had been told were best and most wise. But they never questioned these ways, they never tetsted themselves, and worstly they never dreamed of the things they might be able to achieve.
For the sculptor, this was the most troubling of all. He knew that we all have dreams buried somewhere deep in our chests, that we aspire to great things. But for reasons unknown, we content ourselves to settle for something mundane, something far less. Perhaps because to seek them would be too hard, or that one does not believe in himself. Perhaps it was mere laziness.
Whatever the reason, the sculptor recognized in the people that they were unhappy, and much of this had to do with the fact that they were not working toward their dreams. They had become stuck in a diurnal rut and, unable to extricate themselves, they had resigned themselves to a slow, monotonous march towards death.
The sculptor tried to warn them. “Go after your dreams,” he would urge his friends. But they were only to disappoint. And the more this problem presented itself to Polyamoris, the deeper he sunk into its conemplation. Perhaps the connection is toovague. Perhaps people cant see the link between themselves and as coarse a material as stone.
So he began to work with new media. He tried metals. Copper was the most readily available. And yet, with age it produced the most disconcerting effects. Certainly people woudl love to associate themselves with gold, he thought, as he delicately worked its soft contours. These pieces were expensive, and made him quite a return, but they too failed to produce the desired effect. On and on his experiments went, each garnering him greater fame and fortune, but never quite reaching his goal.
As he continued to fail in his philanthropic quest, he began to fall deeper into despair. Perhaps mankind is yet too dense to realize its potential. Perhaps it is still held in the clutches of a herd mentality, and it will be ages before an individual recognizes the ease with which it can break free.
One day, as he sank deep into these dark broodings, a sharp rap came upon the door to his studio. Expecting it to be another dilletante client, he ignored the interruption at first. But, it persisted. Slowly, he lumbered up out of his chair and went to answer the door.
He was greeted by a curious creature, not a buyer at all, by the ragged looks of him. The visitor was old and decrepit. He leant heavily on a cane and spoke breathily from beneath a bundle of robes. “I have heard of your talents from far away. I have also heard that you employ many different materials in your art. I have a very special sort of material that i wish to offer you.”
For some reason, this mysterious solicitation piqued the interest of the sculptor, and not wishing to be rude, he ushered the stranger inside.
Once seated, the sculptor descended on the visitor who, by candle light, appeared a very old man. “Who are you? And what is this material you speak of?”
“My name is not important. I am a mystic who lives deep within the hills beyond this country. I have traveled far to you because I have divined that you have greater purpose to your art than mere profit. Am I right?” The old man seemed to guess much, and Polyamoris nodded in curious agreement.
“What do you offer, stranger?” The old man took a package from beneath his robes, and carefully unwrapped it. Polyamoris looked intently at the mass in the old man’s wizened hands.
“Fool! That is simply clay! Why do you think i would be interested in that trifle? With my repuation, dont you think I have worked with it by now?”
“Indeed it appears to be clay. But I promise you, it is of no ordinary soil. It possesses magical properties. Though you may mold it easily enough, it shall not stay as you have made it. It will change. It will become as living flesh, and you shall be its master.”
This indeed was a large claim from the old amn, and it took Polyamoris a long time to ponder it. But how could he pass up such an opportunity? With his art, he had hoped to help people take control of their lives, now he was offered a chance to actually create a life that would be at his beck and call. A living organism who would be molded in the image he saw most fit, over whose life he would have ultimate control. This would be the greatest realization of his dream.
Eagerly, Polyamoris accepted the man’s offer and paid him well from his rich treasury. Indeed, he gave the man a few extra coins for his trouble and wished him a safe return. Envigorated and newly inspired, the sculptor immeadiately set about his new creation, his masterpiece. This would be his defining creation.
For weeks he barely left his studio. He slept little, he ate only enough to give him strength to fuel the hammer and chisel. He was consumed by this mission. Weeks turned to months and still he carved away. Slowly, the form of a beautiful woman rose from the heap of enchanted clay. Her graceful curves swam out of the block, gently reaching up toward the sky as if celebrating the glory of the gift of life. A single hand outstretched, and for days he crafted as the hand gave way to elbow, to shoulder, to slender arching of the back. Eventually the contours of legs stepped out of the block, as the feet stretched out of toes which rested on soft grey grass. Though the figure of this beautiful maiden may have seemed finished to others, the sculptor worked on. He labored for a week on each eye, a fortnight on the mouth.
When he was finally done, all who came to admire the work agreed that it was the most beautiful statue they had ever seen. And still, in the cover of night, when the onlookers had gone home, the sculptor worked, laboring tirelessly over each detail, ever increasing her beauty. Exorbitant prices were named, promises of property and political power spoken, but still Polyamoris refused to sell his work. It was his crowning glory.
Eventually, he realized that he had finished. His work, his love, had been completed. There was no more he could improve, no detail had been neglected. He stepped back to look at the work and was finally pleased. This indeed will show them all. I will make her as an example of what every man can create for himself. Contented, he went to bed.
He slept a long time, as he had exhausted himself in his creation. When he finally awoke, he went in to check on his masterwork.
As he walked the perimeter, everything was just as lovely as he remebered, more so perhaps in his full state of restfulness. The graceful curves, the proportions, the hopeful reaching to the skies as a gesture towards dreams. All was as he had intended.
But suddenly, he stopped short. Something about the arms seemed a bit off. He squinted, he changed positions, moved to varying distances. Perhaps it was his imagination, but it seemed as if the woman’s arms did not quite reach as high as he remembered them. It must be my imagination, he thought as he brushed this strange sensation off.
The sculptor went about his business as usual, and though he wasn’t sure people quite understood his message yet, he knew it was only a matter of time. They came en masse to his studio, the people who wished to bid on his masterpiece. That he repeatedly told them it was not for sale did nothing to deter them. In fact, it merely intensified their longing for it.
But in the meantime, the sculptor noticed no real change in the people’s general attitudes towards themselves. They were still missing the point. And what was more troubling became his observations of his statue. After a few weeks, what he had thought was his imagination defintitely had become a reality. He was certain that the arms had begun a very slow descent, and that they almost pointed to a straight ahead angle by now. This was very disturbing for the sculptor, but he could not understand what it meant. He attempted to fix his creation by means of hoists and braces. He implemented wires to hold the arms aloft. But each day, he came to find that they had fallen yet again. Curse that old man! He has sold me defective clay. He must be having a great laugh at my expense now.
Despite his concerns and the obvious change in his work, crowds grew larger by the day, and the clamoring for him to sell the statue grew continuously. Again the sculptor fell to his prevoius worries, and he realized that even all of his skill could not convince the people of what was so plain before him. All they cared for was the statue. They would not concern themselves with anything else.
One night, as the masses cleared finally for the day, the sculptor sat alone. He perched on a wooden stool, and moonlight shone upon him. “Why have you given me this curse, o gods? Why have I been burdened to carry this knowlege and yet my best efforts to share it have been spurned? How can this be so hard to understand, that one can build for himself a masterpiece? That each of us is an artist, an architect of our own lives, that we alone can make our existence what we dream it to be?”
His questions echoed silently on the stone walls of the studio. A rogue breeze answered by blowing a few of his plans onto the floor from their perch on a wooden easel. As they fell, they drew the sculptor’s eyes forward. They fell upon the statue. Though it still stood in beauty, something was changed. The beautiful smile, the delicate features, the graceful curve of the spine, supple thighs and legs still stretched up.
But the arms now completely drooped. They now pointed to the ground, and this finally was more than the artist could bear.
“O cruel life! ceaselss gravity! That you must weigh us all down, even she, who did not live, she was made to felt your weight! She once reached for the stars, and now merely points to where she will be buried. Such a change comes so swiftly, you make your presence felt immeadiately! And cruel old man, I know that you have cheated me! This clay could not be real, it could not be meant to feel. Though I have breathed my very life into it, it cannot possibly live. It is merley dirt, nothing more. Is this what you wished to teach me? That I cannot affect those around me? That I cannot make them understand the promise and power that each of them have? That there is no hope, and that it is better to resign oneself to despair through conformity and society, those most unnatural of masters? They are nothing, and yet, I fear we cannot conquer them, so entrenched in us they have become. And so, is it thus, that a man may spend his entire life to try to reach them, and yet he shall fall on deaf ears? I cannot, then, live in such a world. May my life be a lesson to them, and in it, may they find hope!”
With this, the sculptor raised the hammer high above his head, his chisel upon the throbbing pulse of his temple, and, in the gleam of moonlight, for all the gods to see, he drove home his final strike...
