King of Never-To-Be

NEVER-TO-BE

by Walter de la Mare

Down by the waters of the sea

Reigns the King of Never-to-be.

His palace walls are black with night;

His torches star and moon's light,

And for his timepiece deep and grave

Beats on the green unhastening wave.

Windswept are his high corridors;

His pleasance the sea-mantled shores;

For sentinel a shadow stands

With hair in heaven, and cloudy hands;

And round his bed, king's guards to be,

Watch pines in iron solemnity.

His hound is mute; his steed at will

Roams pastures deep with asphodel;

His queen is to her slumber gone;

His courtiers mute lie, hewn in stone;

He hath forgot where he did hide

His sceptre in the mountain-side.

Grey-capped and muttering, mad is he--

The childless King of Never-to-be;

For all his people in the deep

Keep, everlasting, fast asleep;

And all his realm is foam and rain,

Whispering of what comes not again.

Faust~ A Tragedy

scenes from F.W. Murnau's Faust, 1926.

Medea People

If my dog's future offspring were to evolve into bipedal, manually-dextruous, sad-eyed, tree-dwelling mutant beasts~ this is most assuredly what they will look like.

~Acrylic and pencil on cardstock~

The Dark Meow

"The Dark Meow"~ Acrylic and ink and pencil on paper

The Watchers

"The Watchers"~ acrylic and pencil on index card

Ride the Tyger

"Ride the Tyger"~Acrylic on paper.

The Devil Doll

A creepy scene from Todd Brownings 1936 film "The Devil-Doll"... This tiny assassin was miniaturized by a wicked escaped convict and sent after one of his old grudges... So weird.

The Plague-Swarm

"A RUTHENIAN, having lost his wife and children by the plague, fled into the forest from his desolate cottage and sought safety there. He wandered about all day long; towards evening he constructed a booth of branches, lit a little fire, and fell asleep, wearied out. It was already after midnight when a mighty noise awoke him. He rose to his feet, listened, and heard a kind of songs in the distance, and accompanying the songs a sound of tambourines and fifes. He listened, in no small astonishment, that, when death was raging around, people were rejoicing there so merrily. The noise that he heard kept continually approaching, and the terrified Podolian espied a swarming multitude advancing along a wide road. It was a troop of strange-looking spectres that circled round a carriage; the carriage was black and elevated, and in it sat the Plague. At every step the frightful company kept increasing; for on the road almost everything was transformed into a spectre. "

.... Feebly burned his little fire; a tolerably large firebrand was still smoking a little. Scarcely had the plague-swarm drawn near when the firebrand stood upon feet, extended two arms--the burning part began to glitter with two glaring eyes--it began to sing in concert with the others. The villager was stupefied; in speechless terror he seized his axe and was on the point of striking the nearest spectre, but the axe flew out of his hands, transformed itself into a tall woman with raven-black tresses, and, singing, vanished before his eyes. The plague-swarm proceeded onwards; and the Podolian saw how the trees, the bushes, the owls, the screech-owls, assuming tall shapes, increased the multitude, the terrible harbinger of a frightful death. He fell down powerless, and when in the morning the warmth of the sun awoke him, the vessels that he had brought with him were smashed and broken, the clothes torn to rags, the provisions spoilt. He perceived that no one but the plague-swarm had done him all this mischief, and, thanking God that he had at any rate escaped with life, proceeded further to seek shelter and food."

~~~ Wratislaw, A. H. Sixty Folk-Tales From Exclusively Slavonic Sources. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Company, 1890.

HELLO

Sometimes, I don't even know my own steez

Space Ace

I started this Ace Frehley piece on this Norwegian guy. He liked the Sun Studios logo I gave him last year, so he travelled quite a long way for more music tattooage.

I totally forgot to draw it the night before, and had to whip out the stencil sketch in 20 minutes. I think it turned out nicely.

stalling...

I've had virtually no free time to paint or to write lately. There's been no respite from tattoowork, not during tax refund season... I've been creating alot of my work in my head until I find such time to manifest it on paper. There's a novel and a half brewing inside there, a book of paintings. I'm taking off 5 days this week to get caught up and enjoy other forms of passing the time other than holding a 1lb vibrating hunk of iron with needles at one end.

The woman in my life keeps me well inspired and in good spirits. My mind is flooded with great ideas and schemes. I've worked out several of the most crucial aspects of the graphic novel i'm plotting. Then I figured out a way to finish this fantasy comic in a short span of time, but it's only going to work if I can do it consecutively... I believe I may be needing more than a week off of work to accomplish some of this year's goals, perhaps more like a month. I plan to put a few books out this year, and I can't let the 9 to 5 slow me down. I'm already so far behind. Always behind. You people should see my to-do list!

You would cry...

My birthday is a week from today. I'll be the magic number 32. Celebrations downtown, and I will be surrounded with a few old friends by good fortune. I should dress to impress.

Among Thorns

I have somewhere important to be, but the path is prickly.