And yet I am never content with a portrait I've made.
Likeness is not enough. Sameness of feeling is not enough. Total refusal of kinship with the subject is not enough.

Few of my own portraits satisfy me over a long period of time (past a few days, for instance).
This doesn't dissuade me from creating more portraits; in fact, it's quite to the contrary; arguably, dissatisfaciton wtih my own work

I'm not sure I understand it.

I know very well I don't understand it.

- W.S. Merwin in a talk I attended at the University of Houston, Spring 2012