day three

baxter unfinished

walking man

my college had a cast of rodin's walking man. he stood outside the museum, in an overhang, silently, strongly, remarkably still in his movement. late at night, when there was no one near, i would sit quietly in a chair next to walking man...and watch him. his gorgeous torso...his strong calves...his rock-steady, enormous feet. I knew i wasn't supposed to touch him--he was a work of art--to be admired from afar. i worshipped him. i worshipped the art and the craft and the soul from which he was born.

Very late at night, when i was sure there was no one near, i would place my hand on the frigid cast of his muscled stomach, on the spaces gouged out of his angular back, on the smooth ridge of his superhuman thigh. i couldn't help but touch him. my fingers would itch and a chill would crawl up my spine...i knew it was wrong even as my fingers traced the grooves made by rodin's signature in the base of the sculpture. but how do you stop yourself from doing something you want desperately to do? Walking man was a room full of treasure, and i was hungry for gold.

these sessions would last seconds minutes hours...and i would walk home in the dark, quiet night...calm from my quiet musings and alive from both the thrill of my wrongdoing and my proximity to a work of art that made me disregard all the rules.

not long ago, i returned to the campus. the museum had been redesigned, and they had brought walking man into the museum. he stood in the warmth, in a wash of light that underscored the remarkable talent of his creator...where he should always have been. But for some reason, in that incredible new home, surrounded by a dazzling catalog of painting and sculpture, he had lost, for me, the very qualities that made me adore him.

Gone was he the strong, silent companion of my late night reveries--and, in his place, a devastatingly brilliant work of art.

best of day two