art began as a war against walls
everything in a painting was in danger of being lost
every object that has been moved each

that has been smoothed every piece
outlined was once a living breathing being
water can dissolve rocks

paint on a canvas can bruise
an audience can be traumatized by art that is not lost
intertwining history with the present

is the divide between
good times things
and bad times things

               good times being the sky painted with eyes
               and bad times the sleepless nights we want
               a different kind of archive

art being our act of evasion

(originally published in RASPUTIN, Winter 2020)