The Clincher

I confess I find little delight in the stare of this mask. An intuitive response. Is it groundless? Inquire. Mine eyes turn to the mouth. The bars are like so many little teeth, though they are not teeth at all but guard the delicate breathing filters. Is it true, also, that mine own little teeth - sadly diminished through long toil and strain in these hinterlands - also guard something within? I have thought of them, my whole life, as simple tools for grinding, shredding, tearing. Discomfiting to not know mine own teeth and their physio functions. Yes, the mouth is threatening but not because the "teeth" seek to grind my flesh. Look rather to the eyes. The glass is tinted to prevent the cataracts that arrive so soon in these exposed climes and diminished atmospheres. But the effect is to make the eyes look closed. There it is, Padulweis! The open mouth, the closed eyes - what is this? This is the face of a laughing man. One man o' mirth. That is the "everyman" of the Vay's so-called "classless-spirit." He respects naught. He laughs, thinking that our little museum will be naught, will be no be more than another frontier phantasm. Balderwock!