On Eyes...

They say the eyes are the window of the soul. Certainly, in most of the people that I have come across, this statement holds good. I see the best example of it in my children. My little girl is almost ten and her eyes have changed from being completely innocent and steeped in wonder to a more knowledgeable but slightly wary “are you making fun of me?” look. They still twinkle merrily of course and she could speak with her lovely eyes alone when she chooses to. My son is elder to her and his eyes are undoubtedly the most beautiful I have seen in my life. They are shaped perfectly and enhanced with thick lashes. But it is not of external beauty I wished to talk about. His eyes radiate love. Nothing can compare with their expression. His face itself glows with a clarity that comes from an unclouded mind. Maybe its because he is not capable or desirous of complex thinking. The best part of course is that he is always happy.

I see the eyes of my partner whom I work with every day. Her eyes are liquid and soften when she speaks of the children we work with. Her voice is loud. She can be heard raising her voice often and for hours together but the children, even in their toughest moments, turn only to her. I know its because they can see the affection and dedication in her eyes. They relate to her like they relate to few others in their forcibly curtailed existence.

I have also seen people whose mouths smile with a false intensity but whose eyes dart everywhere like a panicky bird and never linger on you for more than a split second. On interacting with them, one comes away with the feeling that they were trying hard not to dwell on any one thing. Perhaps they were capable of processing only so much. Perhaps the reason those eyes showed insecurity was their tendency to be superficial and willingly delusional. Those are the eyes that look everywhere except at the truth that is before them.

I once read a story long ago in an old Reader’s Digest.  I was perhaps as old as my son is now but the story stayed with me all these years. The story was about how one artist was in search of someone who could serve as a model for his Jesus. He had been commissioned to do a painting for the church. After searching for a while, he came across a young man whose eyes exuded the calm and sanctified aura he was looking for. He painted the young man as Christ and the painting was much appreciated. Years later he was commissioned by the same Church authorities to do another painting and he needed someone to be a model for Judas. He went forth in search of the right model and found a drunken vagrant with eyes that spoke of a life of deceit and sin. He got him cleaned up and painted him as Judas and the result was stunning. After the painter paid the man for his trouble, he turned to him and said “You don’t remember me at all do you?’. The painter looked perplexed and said he was sure he had never met him before. The man smiled and said “It was I whom you painted as Jesus a few years ago. Now I am Judas.”

The eyes do change with your thoughts and actions. They show you as you are; not as you wish to project yourself. I wonder how much my eyes have changed as I walk along paths that twist and turn sometimes away from the light and at other times, towards the light of greater understanding.