The Parable of the Architect

There once lived a man, a cunning architect, who studied subtle and powerful designs and building methods. But curiously, he always lived in the home of some host or other, thanking his benefactors smilingly for their largesse and hospitality even as he settled in ever more comfortably. Finally, though, his smile grew tired and he desired to build for himself a house, a little home where he could live quietly by himself.

So he gathered his tools and set about, with all his considerable craft, to carve a brick—only the highest-quality shaping and handling would suffice—from the flesh of each person he knew. Family members yielded theirs up almost too easily; with a little patience and travel he was able to collect materials from even his distant kin. Friends, old and new, also provided a fertile source of materials. Some balked or resisted, and with some he found it necessary to make several attempts. But eventually he extracted from each a suitable brick, and thanked each with a tight smile.

Still he did not have enough for his designs, so he turned to more distant acquaintances: coworkers, friendly store clerks he had chatted with, people who shared hobbies and diversions similar to his. This proved more difficult than those before, but he was becoming ever more adept in his carving, even as his smile grew strained and frayed.

Finally, he had enough to build his little house. He went into seclusion and spent weeks carefully laying the brickwork, mortaring them with discontinued emotions, making sure the walls were seamless. He finished the outside with a truly beautiful white siding, decorated with climbing ivies and a lovely little garden, so that all who looked at the house could see what an architect he was. By this time he was such a master of external decoration that he did not even have to think about what he was doing.

When his work was done he sat in the middle of his house’s lone room, and looked around, and saw the perfect character of what he had wrought for himself. The walls bled and whispered, and a red light came through the skin-shaded windows. And he has sat there silently ever since, grinning wide and bright and brittle.

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