What I learned #1

I learned that the beautiful is tedious.

I find that if anything is to be beautiful, it has to be intentional. It is because they are crafted painfully and painstakingly that art and literature possess sublimity. That a poem is not a word more or less, that the letters are positioned so, make a poem a poem. On the canvas every dot is thoughtfully planned-- what color, how big, and why? It is because they are not natural- not mere fruits of the stream of consciousness or the instincts of an effortlessly deft hand- that they are literature and art. For to create a thing of beauty is to go against one's every impulse and to push one's every limit. The artist's concern is to transcend his nature and play god. Art and literature cannot be natural. Beautiful things are beautiful because they are unhuman.