Doe. A deer. Here come the tears!

I found this art piece and the story that goes with it. I find it heartbreaking and peaceful. It makes me tear up, but I can't stop looking at their sweet little bodies all cuddled in together. And then I think about how there are a lot of Bambie commercials on right now, because of the blu-ray release. And I always start to cry during the Bambi commercials. Then I think of the shelter animal commercials, and how they send me into a code red mental breakdown. So then I cry more over these darling does. I hope that I am forever snuggled into someone I love. That leads me straight to Rabbit Hole, the movie about losing a child, that only upset me when the dog was involved. Then I feel bad for holding emotions for animals over humans, diagnose myself sociopath, and continue to sniffle for these twin creatures. So, anyway. Yeah. How do you react to this much cute sweetness and harsh reality of mortality? I struggle.

The Twin Fawns, by Peregrine Honig

I came upon Twin Fawns in the display case of a mom and pop toy and science store in Kansas City, Missouri. It took me two years to win the trust of the shop owner and save the money to buy them. A taxidermist spotted a dead deer by the side of the road. He stopped to properly dispose of the body and realized she was pregnant. He opened her and found near full-term twin fawns, he removed and preserved them.

Deer rarely have twins and the taxidermist retained the uterine gesture of their bodies. I built them a vitrine with a light blue base. Their prematurity exaggerates the delicacy of an incredibly sweet thing. The points of their hooves, the length of their lashes, the spots of their hides, nose to small nose in an un-cartoonish realism… Viewers’ eyes trick them into believing the fawns are breathing. The tragedy of beauty is its transience.

The twins live forever in their own demise. They are sleeping beauties. They have been muses since I first saw them.

We dress death in lilies and bronze the names of our dead sons on walls. We erect altars of toys and hold candlelight vigils to express hope. My twin fawns sleep endlessly on their baby blue block in my studio. The twins never opened their eyes yet their wondrous fatality evokes an acceptable alternative to death.