The sculptor and his model

Rodin and Gwen: Metamorphosis.

Yes ,when she came to him, she was blind spirit, a luminous girl. Yes!, he did suck her eyes out of her head, and swish them round in his mouth, tasting them, flavoursome, before pouring them back into her eyes sockets- so yes ,of course she wept, that was the beginning of her tears...

So, yes, he did pull her tongue down his hoary throat, where it flexed bravely, in the gouty, slimy dark place of endless gurgling and volcanic heave ho's.

Yes, she did keep cats, so what?

He torched her hair, it caught fire, he breathed flames from her toes to the top of her head, she crawled from the molten lava of the vat, and her hands were webbed – she stood examining her webbed fingers, she was naked, she felt sensual.

He said : I am God, I am sacred ‘ She shot him a look, he crumbled, and chased her round the studio, belly rumbling, big fat man on thunderous thighs- he caught her but she resisted, and round his frame, draped the golden leaves, the fleur de lis of the tree she was transformed into, tendrils of molten gold enveloped him, stunned him. Surrendered he stared upwards into the eye of night.

Electric as an eel, she unfurled herself, and ran and ran, day and night the manner of their metamorphosis brought the house down, the neighbours complained of shivery feelings, as if this pair who always looked a bit rough, she always a bit dishevelled, him always breathing hard, looking as if he had a fight with a pillow, for feathers were about his person and in his hair – emerged onto the street in daytime seeking breakfast.

Back at the studio,  then, things recommenced: he flung her by the hair from him, she exploded into a molten lava and died. Silence. His triumphant murderous will, but in the outline of emerging form from the lava, he could see the shape of her wings and they began to rise- then her head rose above the mud, and her voice came out in in the notes of a bird- pi pi,she cried. And rose winged and awful, taking the room in great huge strides with her beautiful wings.

Bitch ! He wept on his knees, bitch !

Neighbours commented, the walls of their studio, did they mix somehow their paints on the walls, did they throw whole cans of paint on the walls, the splashes of red, the treacly black, the brown, the ochre, the oranges, the flamingo pink, they were all flung on the walls. An exuberance of colour, like a rag bone yard it was, them, him and her.

Hard to know which was madder. Bitch, he cried on his knees, bitch !

She rested in the air, considered him, dived low and bombed him with her wings, they got entangled in his Samson hair, which wound around her beautiful wings and dragged her down and in, he opened his mouth and swallowed her – she emerged, an egg popped out all smooth and round  and so he sat on her, and she emerged again, smiling brightly, forgetful as she was of the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, she was pretty and things were always better when she had no quarrel with her mirror, and she smiled at him.

He calmed down, he had sat on other things and produced worse, she was good natured, and he wrote her letters, she wrote him letters back, they corresponded ,he gave her books to read, to calm her down.

She burned in the fire, defiant at first, she said my name is Gwen, but the pain and suffering were terrible, she burned and burned. Could nobody see the sheet of fire she burned in? ,then they would not be so cool, so cold, so certain they knew everything.

And then she regressed, soon she was a babbling baby on her knees in the flames, it was too terrible, and the cast of her nature fell away, and the flicker of her life beat, unsheathed, bare in the flames. She cried, suffering in her humanity, in her terrible loneliness and abandonment, he took her in his arms, after all she was a baby. In his great big arms he walked around his studio, searching in his head for some baby lullabies.  She was inconsolable at first, a infant face, tiny hands reached up and clung to his beard.

He sang her hunting songs, and she laughed, a tiny bit of baby drool fell in a wet trickle from her lips, her tiny teeth began to bite and chew. She charmed him, and he soothed and cradled her.

But then practising with her new teeth, she bit him, a human drop of his blood fell on the ground ,it sang a note of warning to him about this incubus he had nestling against his chest, she wailed and bit, and wailed alternatively.  He named her Gwenn, she said that is already my name. But he baptised her anyway like it was his own idea !

She laughed at him, his solemnity and he beat his fists against his chest, and so once more she assumed adult form and stared at him. But he was ready this time and stared back, but still she was elusive.

She put her hands along the sheet ,the flame, the wall of fire seeking its meaning.  Was there no way out ?

Her tears were falling like rain, a golden halo of his smithy work of stars was rising on her head. He was a Vulcan, sat with his hairy legs, thunderous thighs, and a pendulous penis

Stoking the furnace and making his stars in the fire of her, these he then positioned above her head – my lady of the stars ! He mocked her as the molten golden crown sat on her head – my Queen!

He gnawed on the bones of his discontent, for she had not come out quiet right, there was something resistant in her, that mocked even the fire, if he raised the heat she would be skelton and embers . How explain to the cleaning lady ? He remembered that from long ago, that other model. He wanted her neat, uncomplicated, in her molten gold fashioned from head to toe in the fabulous shape of her ardour. He did not want her to escape, she was troubled that was for sure, reaching with piteous hands for ways out of the wall of fire.

But she burned steadily in it, as it subdued her, brought her to her knees and to silence, licking away over her now unconscious form. He let her rest. He stared at her.

She was a peacock and spread her fan of cobalt, greens and blues before his eyes. His plummy fingers made a grab for them, she rose a hissing cobra in his face, greens and blues livid now – she hit him hard between the eyes, he would have to go home  to his wife with two black eyes he wouldn’t know how to explain. She sulked in a corner in her coils.

He poked her with a stick but she would not come out. He raised the temperature, and she stood up shaking in the fire, the walls of flame went where she went. She burned and burned.

Newly inspired he called her Ella. Louise. She hissed at him, sparks flew.

Behind the curtain of fire, she writhed and blew out bubbles, birds came into her hands to feed there, in the moment of miracle her tears ceased. And the fire lapped down low and fell around her feet. She stepped out, exhausted, and slept for what seemed a thousand years, her fingers clenching and unclenching, her face pale, her eyes terrible. In the mercy of God, she rested ,poor soul.

He sucked her blood out like a vampire, and spewed it into a great basin, where it cried out in all its molecules with fear, in every fibre.  He filled her up with golden liquid, turned her head, made her cast her eyes down, caught her hair into a sweep. Swept upwards like it was made of crinoline, fretted gold. It swarmed in waves about her head. Oh she said – do not, feeble. Hardly able.

He twisted her at the hip, forced her leg high into a high arch, and stood her thus for hours, frozen in her golden pelt, the sun beating down on her, silently suffering infinity.

He move her about, grunting, his tongue like sandpaper, he used to lick her round her hunches, soft and supple as creation, then he fixed a mould from her, and poured her blood back into her. She came back shaken, her heart pounding in her chest, he was still returning himself, a great dragon ,his tongue was flicking helplessly in and out.

The sculpture stood before them.  Affronted she realised it was her, her soul. Trembling in some material.

He paid her enough for a good night’s sleep. She walked home through the city, her feet in he air, of course she looked back, her soul was captive there.  She was on an invisible thread, and would have to return, otherwise she would be desolate, otherwise she thought she would die.