Vessel No. 1

I didn’t just return to drawing— I met a stranger with my hands.

She was familiar, but different. The way her features emerged felt unpracticed but refined.

Tattooing had changed me. Even in pencil, my marks came from the machine.

The lady showed me everything I’d learned without knowing.

The restraint. The confidence.

The way I now shape with suggestion instead of smothering detail.

The decision to leave her cheek bare, because the nose already said what needed to be said.

The way her form floats—unfinished but final.

I used to build my drawings one layer at a time.

Now, it’s like I see the end first and move toward it.

Ghost outlines. Soft tension. Strategic absence.

All of it learned from years of finding clarity through obsession.

She wasn’t a return.

She was a reintroduction.

I looked at her and realized—I had been drawing all along.

Just not on paper.

Every tattoo, every mark, every time I held the machine too long or not long enough—

It had been shaping the artist I became when I picked up a pencil again.

And when I did, she came out of the fog like she never left.

She didn’t need gold ears.

Just a stare that doesn’t let you look away.