Ben Sagar

Writing, for me, is like bad taxidermy. There’s this beautiful stag running through the forest that you’ve only ever caught in the briefest of glimpses. Every time you tell your friends about it, they smile and nod, but you can tell they don’t believe you, so you go out into the wilderness and slay this beautiful beast. The process is messy, limbs twist at odd angles, and sticky blood matts its pristine pelt, making it difficult to remove in one uninterrupted piece. Once you do, you drape it over a flimsily constructed frame, stuff it full of filler, and nail it in to position. The next time your friends come over and see it displayed in your home, they ooh and aah over the splendor of the creature, counting its tines and apologizing for having ever doubted your claims. You smile and nod, but all you can see are the incongruities, where the skin is stretched too tight or where the stuffing bulges in all the wrong places. You can still see in your mind’s eye how beautiful the beast was as it flitted between the trees, even if it was only seen in snatches and bites, and you wonder if it would have been better to leave the story untold.