Descriptions of Beauty

A translucent mirage evoking the tender clear light of a purposelessly transcendent moment, soundless and empty and so utterly tender that no onlooker is able to resist being transfixed, despite coy attempts to hide behind self-pity, machismo, or the blank and rigid and numbly comfortable masks of our daily mannerisms—the stock expressions worn when walking down a city street to avoid any accidental emotional involvements, or the confusion so often associated with attempts at making contact with a fellow unknown human being.


She was beautiful, though I am wary of that word as it has been so over-used to become almost meaningless, an empty pleasantry reserved for mothers and female friends who, though undeniably pretty, lack the touch of mysterious allure possessed by certain sights, saints, and sinners that may lift an unsuspecting and scarcely prepared onlooker into a transcendent realm beyond the mere rules of aestheticism as it is commonly understood, to a place where subtle marks and asymmetry are no longer the flaws of a woman who has failed to fit a mental model of appeal and become the vibrant characteristics that identify a noble and unique human being, necessary reminders that she is not something as vague and ill-defined as an idea but has all the cracks and textures of what is overwhelmingly and undeniably real.