Thursday, June 28, 2007

Lines

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What is it men in women do require
The lineaments of Gratified Desire.
What is it women do in men require
The lineaments of Gratified Desire.



-- Wm Blake



Great old word that, lineaments, no longer much in use. An outline hinted at, is how we would put it today—except that outline suggests too much of contour and silhouette, not enough of the body lines. Lineaments: the lines, the main structure, the suggestion of it, the indication and idea of it, projectable from the surface, leaving aside almost the body itself, the skin and bones and flesh and motion and the very soul—all there but abstracted.

What besides origami accomplishes this, hovers so precisely between idea and entity? Intelligence not quite incarnate, still hinting, suggesting, but obeying for all that its own strict laws.



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