The Whittler

There's a knack to carving wood that most don't have.   It's the way whatever you're carving changes in position and expression with the pictures in the grain,   Even a shock of hair twists from constant wind or a rock too  big for a root to move.   sometimes a dragon's wingtip bends to grain.  That's after the first deep cuts that tend to change muscular structures.   What started as an arm becomes a goose's neck and fingers change to beak as a tree reaches for sunlight.   Then again some works stay human but less heroic, sometimes more so in their infirmity.   I've seen a belt sander change a fish from fat to sideways and large mouth to calico with just a simple turn.  Sometimes it's the grain, sometimes it's the knife that cuts too deep, but just like painting in oil mistakes can make perfection from imperfection.

It's sorta like my life has been an' how things turn out.

Reviews

[Peanuts for Prose]

I like the parallels and deeper meaning.

[JohnL]

The good woodcarver is a pragmatist - he sees potential in the natural shape of a root or branch and goes ahead but you can never put wood back so the muscular man's arm becomes the slim beauty's then as mistake follows mistake and the final shape resembles a swan's neck, a slip of the knife redesigns a work of art, but always the carver talks of success.

[An Ordinary Woman]

I bought my youngest a set of carving blades. I watched him whittle sticks into canes and then he carved little figures. I adore them. Your insightfulness is perect and appreciated.

Thank you dear friend

[Gandré]

I really liked how you look back at your life and how you introduce us to your seeing the world, in a way showing the falling us 'the petal before you speak of gravity, we learn to know the perception of the painter and the poet. Everything is just perfect how it is, for you didn't use force to reach this amiable style.

[Samuel Dickens]

You're way deeper into the subject than I've ever thought about, but I have great appreciation for the art. Being a bit of an artist, (painting, drawing) I understand the concept of what I've heard called the "happy acident" in which a mistake becomes a stroke of genius.

[Narnie]

I adore this. Absolutely. My grandad was a carpenter and once you respect, appreciate the wood with which you work, your craft breathes life. As your writing does too Donald.