I try to post a variety of images every day to ModBlog.  And with every image I post, I try my best to make a story around it.  I see a tattoo of Prince’s love symbol, and I think of both the artist and the dedication of his fans.  I see a candid image from a pulling performance, and think of the outer expressions of inner pain.

Then I see an image like this…

…and I’m at a loss for words.

Which of course got me to thinking, what is it about certain images and action that can take our breath away.  To render even the most expressive of us speechless.  Is it some base instinct that we have, like the fight or flight reactions, that when we are emotionally overwhelmed we react by silencing ourselves?  Or is it a cultural phenomenon, where we’ve been raised in a world where the effects of the Romantic period have permeated our collective consciousness.  The moment where our minds are presented with an overwhelming amount of emotional stimulation causes us to take pause and reflect on the images before we are able to express ourselves and our reactions.

Now that I’ve had a moment to reflect on the image, I think that it conveys exactly what I was just talking about.  We have this woman looking outwards her lips bound by a black ribbon woven through her piercings.  You see through her eyes that she has something to say, but for the moment she cannot speak.  It is only when the ribbon is removed, can she express herself fully.  So we too, in those moments when everything falls away and we get lost in the image, have our lips bound, not by ribbon, but by our own minds.  We pause, holding everything in until the right moment, when we can remove our own ribbons and are free to speak again.

I want to thank BMEzine.com member Scissor_Kitty for submitting this image to the piercing galleries.  So while you may not like every image in the galleries, there are certainly enough images in there that can take your breath away, simply through the story the image is telling.