The Artist

It was a private screening, no appointment needed.

A final masterpiece.

Like an artist’s art, it was modern with strokes of gaudy colour, thick applications, no planning or design. It was on a large canvas of magnolia, an ideal wash of matt, a clock against the border, framed complete with some brick exposed, wire from a lamp.

Like mosaic in a way, big and small segments, like a mix of stained glass in and out of line, the darker shades blended in with chunks, oozed out like paint from a tube, thick smears, impasto in places.

And in some areas, burnt black fabric, intertwined with red and white running down the wall, splatter on the floor, the frame shattered by the bullet as it passed through bone and brain and memories; through receptors and nerves and grey matter; the colours scattered randomly in obscure arrangements.

thirty eight special,
a smooth, herring bone handle,
his dad’s revolver.