It was more than a dash, a speckling really. Nuanced, I know, but important. It had to be, it dealt with beauty.

The difference was qualitative rather than quantifiable.

Beauty was like that. One degree off and it might be horrid rather than beautiful. Pretty and cute were rather further away, strange though that might seem. Not quite as closely related.

It’s like the proximity between love and hate. Liking and disliking are rather further away and indifference much further yet.

Separated by a thin film, perhaps a molecule thin, maybe two, but not more. The difference between a dash and a speckle. The difference between life and death and folly and despair.

Almost unipolar but not quite, but close enough not to be bipolar and certainly not multi polar.

Separated by a thin film, perhaps a molecule thin, maybe two, but not more. The difference between a dash and a speckle. The difference between life and death and folly and despair.

It’s like the proximity between love and hate. Liking and disliking are rather further away and indifference much further yet.

Beauty was like that. One degree off and it might be horrid rather than beautiful. Pretty and cute were rather further away, strange though that might seem. Not quite as closely related.

The difference was qualitative rather than quantifiable.

It was more than a dash, a speckling really. Nuanced, I know, but important. It had to be, it dealt with beauty.
_______

© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2017; all rights reserved. Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia although he has primarily lived in the United States of America (of which he is a citizen). Until recently he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). He can be contacted at wacalvo3@autonoma.edu.co or guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at http://www.guillermocalvo.com.