angels and devils

This doubles as a page in the Music of the Stringless Harp journal, and the Illustration Friday installation. I just finished it - I had a dream last night and I wanted to draw it out while the feelings were still fresh. An old friend appeared last night and though in waking life we were never lovers, we thought about it. Didn't really come close, but we're still close friends even though we haven't actually spoken for...oh god, way too long. I tried calling him just now but no dice - not even an answering machine. He lives a few states away.

So anyway, in the dream, we found each other again and slipped hands under rumpled shirts.

I've since shed the notion that skin on skin (and more precisely, outside of marriage) is devil's territory: being brought up in the Mormon religion, they'd have me believe it so. I think I've effectively excommunicated myself. It's just too black and white, for one thing. I like playing with the archetypes and embodiments of angels and devils but there are just too many nuances and shades of grey in the human experience and psyche for there to be hard and fast good/bad rules.

I think.

Ha ha!

Doesn't mean I don't have a freakin' conscience. But my body, and my life, is my own. Doesn't mean I don't have a responsibility as a cognizant being to tender care, either, for myself and for others.

Happy illustrating, everyone.