He Caught Her Image in His Own Way
Painting a portrait in words
His hair was a thick, wild, frenzy of black waves colliding against one another and forming heaps and mountains to stand tall on top of his head. It concealed the majority of his smooth forehead, only revealing part of it that left the rest to mystery. And that was the joy to it; everyone waited for him to casually sweep his dark, soft, slight curls back and to the side to reveal just how big or small his forehead actually was. Any creases of stress on that plane? Any freckles, scar, or blemish? The mere thought of not knowing what was beyond that wild mass of hair caused people to squirm in anticipation to reveal the unknown.
Beyond the sea of dark hair and a concealed forehead were a pair of vibrant, warm eyes. They were a wonderfully mesmerising work of art of their own; nothing could ever match these two beautifully intricate honey-green marbles. If you had a piercing stare, you might notice the way his eyes looked like gold and emerald woven together to form an astounding masterpiece — one which was arduous to tear your gaze away from. It almost felt like a crime to look away from something so pure and authentic, because not only were they blatantly beautiful, but they were also shamelessly true. They held the truth that his mouth cannot speak, expressed the emotions he could not communicate, and was a window to his soul.
His nose, a sculpture moulded to perfection, was a relatively short, downward slope to connect to his symmetric nostrils that were neither too small, nor big. They’d flare as he deeply inhaled, and would twitch when he’d smell something funny. Moving further down from his nose was his cupid’s bow, free of any stubble and well defined. His pink lips were always etched into a knowing smirk, causing the dimple on his right corner of his lips to engrave itself on his unblemished skin. His jawline was sharply defined, like that of a fatal blade, even more so as he clenched it.
And as his unwavering gaze persistently lingered on the painter across the room, who was perched up on a wooden stool and had her beautiful brows furrowed and biting her lower lip in focus as she poured all her talent into the canvas, he took note of the way she expertly splattered paint and guided it onto the canvas. She was a creator of the contents of a canvas — her own world, with her rules and her personal artist’s touch. Very slowly, the longer he admired the way she painted him, and watching her often glance his way to get his features just right, his arrogant smirk slowly faded, and gradually morphed into a small, humble smile. Because as she was pouring all this effort into a magnificent art piece, and as much as he was aware that he himself was referred to as art by an infinite number of people, he knew he could never compare his existence with her talent.
He was blessed with beauty, but he did not feel as though he possessed the talent she had. And the thought humbled him. Perhaps he did not know how to paint, but he knew how to capture images into words. And so, as he sat there, he painted her but in his own way — in his head, and in words.
And he liked to call it a descriptive portrait.
