passion

There's a greatness, a certain prodigiousness, that radiates from all genius. It's in their eyes - a liveliness, a type of burning, which, once witnessed, is never forgotten.

It's been said that women could not resist Picasso's stare, that his gaze bored into others with thunderous intensity.

Before the syphilis made him crazy, there was a volcanic glow which burned behind Nietzsche's eyes.

Dr. Henry Abrams, Einstein's opthamologist, has been quoted as saying of the physicist: "When you look into his eyes, you're looking into the beauties and mysteries of the world." In fact, he liked them so much that he removed Einstein's eyes during the autopsy in 1955.

I feel like I could expand on this idea further, but, after a weekend of excesses, my brain is not functioning to capacity.

Went to our going away party on Saturday - had way too much fun. My sleep that night/day was riddled with dreams of this wasteland, of sorts. I was looking at my brain as this large windswept prairie: sand dunes with tufts of brown grass sprouting from the top, telephone lines are broken and billowing from decaying wooden poles, tumbleweeds blow by. But for the wind, it's all silent. Occasionally, I get the sense that a giant plug is being pulled somewhere, power is lost, synapses being widened.

There are areas of deadness. Somewhere, something has been destroyed.

I'm in a dilapidated mansion now, and I'm terribly afraid that the whole world will soon be powerless. As I run from room to room, the lights are being shut down all around me. I'm frantic. I'm chasing the last bit of electricity. I see myself lying in bed now, and I can both feel and see the muscles twitching in my body.

I wake up at this point and my mouth is so dry I can not swallow. I reach for the real glass of water beside my bed and lift it, trembling, to my lips.

I'm weak. I have been running all night.