We tell a lie; but we tell the truth. A lie being one of many, perhaps one taken out of infinity. A lie expands, stretches, grows, reaches. But the truth, for the truth, there is only one. Solid, defined, inviolable. Whatever the truth is, wherever the truth is, it is whole, it is complete, it is. Whatever it is. Whatever it is, whatever it must be – not might be –, whatever it, the truth must be we could never tell it. There is no telling the truth. We might, for all of our effort and good conscience, tell our part of the truth. But you can’t really have a part of the truth. But, because it’s one of many, because it’s one of any, you could tell part of a lie. Besides, a little of the truth is the best disguise for a lie.

I am a liar. I am a fraud, a pretender, a fake, an unreasonably facsimile, a cheat. I’m a phony. Everything is a lie, everything is many lies. I am the accumulation of lies, why not? This space is imaginary. These pictures, not real; these words, not real. There is no Murphy, there is no Silas. I am not here. I was never here. A little truth, perhaps less useful than many lies. There is no whole truth. So help me God. Or if there is, there is no way we could begin to tell it.

Art, whatever art is, art is a lie that attempts to purify, distill, reveal the truth. Art. Artifice. Artificial. Artifiical is not fact. Art is not true; art is not fact. Artifact? An artifact is in fact not art but a tiny fragment of the truth.

A diary, because it has no end and no beginning, is not art. True, a painting has no beginning and no end, and a painting could be art. But a diary is not art. But if it were art, even; it would still be a lie. All art is a lie. All artists are liars.

I am a liar and a cheat. Or perhaps I’m just lying about that too. And if the truth is solid and whole and inviolable perhaps the truth is as solid and as encompassing as everything; which is to say that the truth comprises everything, including all of the lies of which, presumably, there are very many. Including this one too.

I have never been a juror.

SS