The Subway Motif

    Up there I was Maxine, but down here, down in the subway tunnels, I was Max.  Just Max.  Boyish, I know, but that’s the point.

The school bell was about to ring.  I knew it because I had synced my digital watch to it.  It was almost 3:10, and I was getting impatient.  My unmanageable, rusty red hair was pulled back into two long braids traveling down my back while my short bangs came just into the top of my vision as I stared at the paper in front of me.  I had worn another one of my many dresses.  This one was a light blue, with lots of ruffles and ribbon.  My mom liked it the most. 
    Riiiing!!  Finally the bell rang, and I was up and out of the classroom before it had even finished its always-the-same shriek.  I rushed to my locker upstairs, my high heels clicking on the stairs the whole way.  Just as always, I already had my messenger-style book bag ready inside my locker.  Its faded, smoky-tan color definitely contrasted with my dress, but I didn’t care.
    I finished packing my things, then flew down the stairs once more with just enough time to yell, “See ya Monday!” to my only friend in the school, Melody—to me Mel.  She just waved as I ran out of her sight, use to my normal rushed behavior after the school bell, especially on Fridays like today. 
I burst through the double-doors and out into the street, the sun shining brightly, gleaming off the hot pavement of the road.  I quickly kicked off my heels and headed down the sidewalk at a fast jog.  When I finally made it to the park almost fifteen minutes later, my shoes oddly in hand, I rushed into the small public restroom, already pulling the braids out of my hair. 
    But the girl that stepped out of the restroom wasn’t Maxine, it was Max, the real me.  I no longer wore my feminine blue dress.  Instead I was in baggy blue jeans, a big red T-shirt, and an even bigger white-and-black-plaid jacket.  I had traded my black high heels for old tennis shoes, the soles about to wear out as I walked in them.  My mother would have killed me had she seen me—she didn’t even know I owned these clothes. 
    As I stepped out, I pulled one last thing out of my bag.  It was a red and black baseball cap.  I carefully fitted it over my head, tucking my long hair under it until only my bangs showed.  I no longer looked like the feminine young woman that had stepped into the restroom.  Now I looked like a boy, my baggy jeans and jacket making me as straight as a freakin’ stick, but it’s not like I was very curvy to begin with.
    Now my book bag matched my clothes, and as I finished tucking my hair into my cap, I headed down to the river, just like every day.  I swore there should have been a path worn into the grass the same shape as my too-big feet.  I came up to the large oak tree that loomed out over the river, and I quickly ducked behind the large trunk, peering around the mossy bark with a large smile to that one spot on the riverbank, looking for him once again. 
    But there was no one there. 
    I could feel my heart sinking into my stomach as I realized there was absolutely no one by the river.
Every Friday I had come out here for eight weeks straight.  And every Friday there was a man sitting by the water’s edge, a large canvas in his lap and a charcoal pencil in his hand.  Every Friday I had watched him draw the large scene before him.  The way the pencil moved across the paper to make the ripples in the water had completely mesmerized me.  I had watched as the picture grew from a simple sketch to a grand masterpiece, but still unfinished. 
    Well where is he? I asked myself, now dropping my book bag at the roots of the oak tree that shot up like zombie hands in a graveyard in some over-the top horror film.  I carefully looked around before stepping out to where he would always sit and work.  I now stood right where he would have been sitting, but there was still no one in sight.  Now I was getting worried.  I was always one to worry.  Worry about this, then that, then back this.  Yeah, I’ll admit it, it’s not like a big secret or anything.
    “Excuse me, but you’re in my spot,” suddenly came a smooth voice from behind me.  I practically jumped out of my skin, giving a high-pitched shriek as I snapped my head around to face the man.  And—just my unlucky luck—there he was, the very person I had been looking for.  He stood tall and thin, green eyes peering at me in curiosity from underneath sandy-blond bangs.  The man couldn’t have been a day over twenty-one.
    He stared at me a moment, and I did the same, when he finally blinked a few times.  “Wait,” he began in that smooth voice, “I know you.  You’re that boy who watches me draw ever Friday.”
I sucked in a breath.  I really had thought I hadn’t been caught.  The guy was good, I gave that.  “Um, uh,” I coughed a few times, trying to deepen my voice, “Y-yeah.  I, uh, I,” now I was just stuttering, trying to buy time.
    “Wait a minute,” the man began again, leaning in to peer at my face.  The smell that came to my nose reminded me of when I would walk by the old candle shop down the street.  I leaned back in response, tucking my head into my chest and trying to hide my eyes under the rim of my baseball cap.  “You’re not a boy,” the man continued, narrowing his Nile green eyes at me, “You’re a girl!”
No duh, I thought sourly, knowing how my eyes would always give me away.  Something about having long eyelashes or something…
    “So, what’s your name then?” the man continued, ruffling his short and wavy sandy-blond hair ever so imperturbably.  (Big word, ain’t it?  I’m pretty verbose.)
    “Max,” I muttered, still a bit sour.
    “’Max’,” he repeated lightly, rubbing his chin as he straightened out his back, his lively eyes looking about the sky for something I couldn’t see.  “A boy’s name.”
    “It’s short for Maxine!” I blurted out, oddly angered.  This man was just too strange up-close, though he was probably thinking the same thing about me.  Boy, was I the pot calling the kettle black or what?
    “So, Maxine,” he said, pronouncing my name all-too-clearly, “Why is it that you watch me every Friday?”
    “Call me Max,” I said dryly, trying to put a harsh edge on my voice.
    “And…?” he urged, obviously my sharp tongue not getting to him in the least.
    I waited a moment, when I finally stuttered out, “I like your drawings.”  I had almost hoped he didn’t hear me.
    He suddenly flashed a smile, but not just any smile.  His eyes almost closed in bliss as one side of his thin lips raised itself higher then the other in a lovely crooked grin.  It made me want to laugh, not that it was funny, but that it just made me feel so light inside.
    “Well, do you draw?” he asked.
    I felt the lightness in my chest now leaving with my breath, being replaced with what felt like lead.  “I’ve tried to draw…” I muttered.  Yeah, I had tried, and failed miserably to my standards.
    “Then may I see?” he continued, flashing perfect teeth as his grin widened, which made me green with envy, my mouth full of more metal that I had thought humanly possible. 
    “I guess,” I garbled reluctantly, walking back over to the oak tree and digging a black sketchbook out from the depths of the black hole I called my backpack.  I handed it over to him, looking away as he opened the cover.  I didn’t want to see the look of disgust I was sure would end up on his face, but curiosity got the better of me once more, and I snuck a peek at his expression.
    I was more the shocked.  He kept up his wide grin, looking on at the pages of hard-pressed scribble.
    “This is great!” he exclaimed, “You’ve got talent, for sure!”
    “Yeah right!” I said as I rolled my eyes, snatching the book away and shoving it back into my backpack.  “It’s terrible!”
    “Everyone starts somewhere, and let me tell you,” he began, “It’s much better then when I started.”
I just rolled my eyes again. 
    “Well, if you’re not satisfied with that, then have you tried other media?”
    I looked back to him, slightly puzzled, and managed to stutter out, “Well…I like to work on, uhm, ‘big canvases’.”
    “Wonderful!  May I see?”  This guy seemed too bright, too happy.  But it made me want to smile.
    “Well,” I began, trying my hardest to sound reluctant, though I really did want him to see, “It’ll kinda take some time to get there.”
    “I have all the time in the world.  I’m a freelance artist,” he replied pertinently.
    I led him though the park to the east gate, hiding a smile as I thought of how he was going to react.  We kept walking through the streets, over multiple crosswalks and small bridges, past happy families laughing and playing, and still onward.  Slowly, the number of people around us began to diminish, until we came to a large stairwell leading deep into the cement and concrete of the large sidewalk.  It was the entrance to a subway tunnel, and on the large gate above its entrance the words, “Edom Town Subway” had been marked over with red spray pain so it now read, “FreEdom Town Subway.”  The “F” was backwards of course.
    I began my trek down the stairs and the old, no-longer-working escalators.  The man stayed right behind me, following me down the dark tunnel, a bright light filtering in from behind us, when I suddenly pulled a sharp turn into a tight corridor, light suddenly rushing out to greet us like a herd of sheep to salt.  The small alley quickly opened up into the larger tunnels and walkways of the original subway, the tall walls lined with clear and well-kept lamps.  It seemed almost like daylight, my shadow hiding from the bright rays at my feet. 
    I turned to see the man looking about us in both wonder and bewilderment.  I gave a smile as I too looked out into my world.  We were surrounded by twenty or so literally multi-colored people, all painting on the large canvas of the stony walls.  Their skin and clothes were brushed and splattered with paint, some people looking just like rainbows.  I heard the man give a light laugh, watching the men and women work.  Most used spray-paint, some just threw the paint straight onto the wall, while others stood with pallets and brushes.
    One man was working on a very dramatic and abstract mural, seeming to be preaching about a racial divide.  His arms were painted many colors, and his once white shirt now looked like it had been pulled from the 1970’s.  I watched with a smile as he waved a paint-covered hand at me, then dipped it straight into a bucket of bright red paint and slapped a glob of it onto the wall.
    Another woman, a few yards down, was working very meticulously on a breathtaking landscape of a foxhunt.  She continually bobbed her head to some unheard sonata, occasionally flicking her left hand around as if she were conducting it herself while her right skillfully worked on the fox’s head with a paintbrush that’s head was no bigger then the eye of a needle. 
    I tossed a glance back over my shoulder to see the man’s reaction to the many people and paintings.  He still seemed to be taking it all in.  The sound of the spray paint cans, the drumming of hands on cardboard boxes, the buzz of the bright lights that lined the wall—it all was coming together in some kind of backwater symphony, no director needed or, for that matter, wanted.
    “Well, what do you think?” I asked him, pulling his vibrant green eyes back to me.
    “Amazing,” he breathed, when he suddenly made a face.  “Wait, is all this legal?”
    I just laughed.  “Of course,” I said, “The subway was closed down years ago, and the old tunnels were opened to artists for ‘legal graffiti’.” 
    “Oh.”
    “Come on, I’ll show you my wall,” I said, now suddenly more happy then when I was above ground.  I began walking down past the many people, most of them waving or shouting some of my many nicknames.  We kept walking for a ways down, until I came to one of the back walls, where a tall, dark-skinned man was working with spray-paint not too far down.
    “Hola, niña!” he greeted in Spanish, “You back again?” he continued in a heavy accent.  And for those of you who aren’t all too fluent in Español (Spanish for “Spanish”) he simply said, “Hello, girl!”  He had dubbed me “niña,” claiming that he couldn’t pronounce “Max.”  He was Thomas Martinez, coming all the way to my little town from Mexico, all to make a name for himself as an artist, and I thought he had a good chance at it.
    He asked a few more things, some of his words English and others Spanish.  He had problems with the grammar, mixing up the Spanish and English rules some times. 
    “Is he tu padre?” he asked, motioning to the man behind me.
    “Oh no, he’s not my father!” I exclaimed, waving my arms about in protest.  We didn’t even look alike.  Sometimes Thomas wasn’t the brightest color of paint on the pallet, but he was worldly at least.
    When I was done explaining myself to Thomas, I turned back to the man, a wry smile on his face after listening to Thomas’s and my little rant.
    “So anyways,” I began, clearing my throat, “This is my wall.”  I motioned to the large expanse of bricks and concrete with my right arm.  Multiple spray-paint murals dotted the wall.  Most were of the very people who I knew right here in the subway.  The man looked on in wonder at the paintings, a slight chuckle in his throat when he came to a portrait of Thomas working on his wall.  I beamed with pride, glad I could finally show someone outside of my little world inside the tunnels my art.  Yeah, I had never shown anyone these paintings, my parents didn’t even know I came down here so often.  I guess they always thought I was at the park or something.
    I watched as the man stepped close to the paintings, running his fingers over the bumpy bricks and uneven paint, then step back again, his smile even broader.
    “Now this,” he began, “This is amazing!”
    “It’s nothing,” I muttered.  Yeah, you can go ahead and hand me my humble pin now.
The man rubbed his chin as he continued to stare at the many pictures, his lips parting in that perfectly content grin.  I watched him a while longer, when my smile suddenly started to fade.
He glanced over to me once, when it turned into a long stare.  “What’s wrong?” he asked me, tuning to face me.
    I looked back up to him, then down to the ground.  My hand grazed over my book bag still over my shoulder, feeling the rough binding of the old sketchbook within it. 
    “Uhm,” I began quietly, my voice suddenly choked off, “C-could you please…teach me to draw!”  I blurted it out as fast I could, clenching my fists.
    The man gave a small smile.  “Why would you need me to teach you to draw when you can already do all of this?”  He motioned towards the many pictures along my wall.
    “Because!” I stuttered out, “I want to learn to draw pretty things...,” I finished more quietly, “Those are grungy, spray-paint graffiti.” 
    “It’s art,” he said almost sternly, yet still so caringly.
    “But I want to learn to draw pretty things like you do!” I protested.  I could feel the lump in my throat growing as my bottom lip began to quiver.  I bit it hard to make it stop, not wanting to cry in front of him.
    The man gave a deep sigh.  “Like I said,” he began calmly, “I’m a freelance artist.  I travel all over to paint and draw the landscapes.  This is just one of my stops, and I’ll be leaving in a few days.”  I could feel my heart plummeting down as he spoke.  “I could give you a lesson or two, but I’ll have to leave very soon.  Besides, you are good at drawing, and with a few years of practice—”
    “I don’t have a few years!” I shouted, finally feeling a few warm tears sliding down my cheeks.  “In a few years it’ll be too late,” I garbled, my tears making it hard to even for words.  I quickly tried to wipe my eyes with my sleeve, but more just kept coming.
    The man looked confused.  “What?  Why do you not have a few years?”
    “Because,” I blubbered, “By then I’ll have forgotten.”  I sniffled a few times, trying to keep myself together, though I knew pieces of me were already crashing to the floor like glass.  “I want to be able to draw a pretty picture, one of me and my friend Melody,” my voice cracked, “’C-cause her parents are making her move out to another state to live with her aunt because they think it’s not safe here.  I want to draw a picture of us together, laughing and talking like we always do, so I don’t forget her.  I want to be able to draw my Collie Bailey too.  I got her three years ago as a puppy for my birthday, and a month ago she was hit by a car.  A stupid car that didn’t even slow down after it hit her!” I blubbered, “I want to draw a picture of her and me before I forget her too.”
    I sucked in a few breathes, trying to keep my heart from exploding.  “But most of all,” I managed out, “I want to draw a pretty picture of me and my mom and dad.”  I wiped my eyes once more, my sleeve now soaked.  My eyes were probably red and puffy, and my eyebrows pulled into tight wrinkles.  Some girls are pretty no matter what, still looking beautiful even when they cried—I wasn’t one of them.  “M-my parents aren’t getting along, and they’re gonna get a divorce.  I just want to be able to draw a picture of us together as a happy family, before the money problems, before Dad lost his job, before they stopped loving each other.  I won’t be able to do that in a few years, because it’ll have been too long for me to remember a happy family, or what it was like to laugh with Mel at the park, or sleep with Bailey outside in the sun.  And I already think I’m forgetting.”
    I heard the man give a deep sigh, that perfect smile of his gone.  “Well, why can’t you do something like your murals here?” he asked.
    “Like I said,” I started, the tears no longer flowing from my eyes, “These are all grungy, not pretty like your art.”
    “But you know the world isn’t pretty, right?” he suddenly began, his voice soothing, “The world is just like these many paintings here: grungy.  The world is a harsh place, that’s why your parents are fighting, why Mel’s family is making her move, and why that car didn’t even slow down after hitting your Bailey.  In my art, I try to erase that pain that the world brings, but in yours, you can see that all of your heart is in it.  It’s not just a picture, it’s feelings and emotions.  My art is simply the kind of things you might see in an old woman’s house.  They’re about denial, denying the fact that the world isn’t that beautiful.”
    I sniffled a few more times.  I liked what he said, though it made me want to start crying again.  His voice was so light and breathy, but comforting and strong.  I wasn’t quite sure what to say or even think for that matter, when I finally decided on something after a long moment of silence.  “I want to show you a few more pictures,” I murmured, wiping my eyes one last time.
    He simply nodded, following me a small ways to a long bridge-like part of the walkway, spanning over a wide tunnel, rusted tracks lining the bottom.  It was only eight or nine feet bellow us, and I did as I normally would, scooting off the edge slightly and then lowering myself down into the tunnel, dropping down to my feet onto the dusty floor.  The man simply jumped down, landing perfectly, so unlike little uncoordinated me.
    I motioned with my head to one of the walls, where three large murals lay on the old bricks and concrete.  The man looked on, rubbing his chin once more as a light smile graced his lips.
The center one was of Mel and me, sitting on a park bench looking up far into the blue sky, popsicles in our hands.  We were laughing and smiling, enjoying life as time passed us by.
    The one next to it was of a large Border Collie sleeping belly-up on soft green grass, a slightly smiling me laying beside her, my legs crossed and my arms behind my head. 
    The last one made the man’s eyes soften.  A beaming me was in the center, my mother and father on either side as I held one of their hands in each of mine.  We were all smiling and laughing, being a happy family.  I was in boyish clothes, not the fancy dresses my mother made me wear, and my long, unmanageable hair was tossed over my shoulder, not hidden under a ball cap. 
    He gave the three pictures one last look, then turned back to me.  “I’ll tell you what,” he began softly, “Meet me in the park at this time tomorrow, and I’ll have something for you.”



    I gave a sigh as I looked down to my watch for the umpteenth time in a row.  Glancing around the park, I found myself all alone—again.  I was about to give up, when I finally saw him walking down the street towards the park entrance.  It was like the dark clouds had parted and angels were singing “Glory, Glory, Hallelujah.”
    He came over to me at a decent stroll, a few manila folders under his arm as he greeted me with a warm smile.
    “You’re late,” I said, trying to sound grumpy, but I was too overjoyed just to see him for it to work. 
    “Punctual, are we?” he teased, his lips parting in a wide grin.  I just gave a crooked smile back, when his face began to turn more stern.  “Now listen closely,” he began, extending the two manila folders to me.  I folded my fingers around them carefully, but he refused to let go.  “Do not open these,” he pronounced clearly, “Give this one to your parents,” he motioned to the one with the red tag, “Make sure they open it together.  And give the other one to your friend Melody.  Tell her to open it with her parents.”
    I looked up at him in bewilderment, but nodded my head as a slight, “A-alright,” parted my lips.  The man let go, the folders falling into my hands.  Then he straightened his back out, that perfect smile once again lighting up his face. 
    “And good luck,” he told me.  “You’ll be a great artist one day.  Trust me, I know,” he tapped his finger to his temple with a sly grin.
    “Are you leaving already?” I asked fearfully, feeling my heartbeat picking up speed until it was doing a staccato drum roll inside my chest.
    “I’m a freelance artist, remember,” was his reply, when he swiftly turned around, heading down the path out of the park once more, not even saying a goodbye. 
    I glanced down at the folders in my hands, then quickly stood up, brushing myself off before running straight home.
    My parents had gone out, and I knew they would be home soon.  I placed the folder in full view on the table, writing in big red block letters “PLEASE OPEN” on the front.  Me being me, I carefully hid myself behind the sofa in front of the hallway that led to my room. 
    I only had to wait all of three minutes—which felt like all eternity and a day to me—for the door to open and my parents to walk in, both of them caught up in another argument, this time about racism, when my mother saw the folder on the table.  The harsh words stopped for a moment as she carefully opened the top, my father moving to her side for a better look.  She pulled out what looked like a photo-sized piece of paper, when she suddenly started to cry.  A few silent tears slid down her face before she shoved the paper into my father’s chest and ran out onto the veranda.  My father glanced down at the paper, his face looking unnaturally soft and solemn before he too walked steadily out onto the veranda after tossing the paper and the folder onto the table.
    I waited a moment, confused and baffled, when the curiosity finally set in.  I carefully crept over to the table, looking down at what was inside the folder.  It was a photo, a photo of the large spray-paint mural I had done of my once-happy family in the subway.
    I quickly slinked out of the room, heading to my bedroom and closing the door rather loudly after me.
I could easily guess what was in the folder I was suppose to give to Mel, but I wasn’t going to look.  The man had told me not to, as if there was some kind of magic pixie dust sprinkled inside the folder, and opening it would release it in a glittery cloud only to be carried away into the wind. 
    The following Monday I gave the folder to Mel, telling her exactly what the man had told me to.  I didn’t even miss a word.  Now all that I could do was hope that something would come of all this, and that that man would one day return to bring more sunshine into my life.



    It was exactly a year later, 365 days, when I found myself sitting under the large oak tree by the river, a sketchbook in my lap and a graphite pencil in my hand.  I rolled up the sleeves of my plaid jacket so I wouldn’t smear the fine lines, then tossed my even longer red hair over my shoulder, keeping it out of my vision so I could draw.  My sneakers squeaked together a few times as I adjusted my position to get comfortable in my baggy blue jeans.  I glanced back to the river, continuing to sketch out the trees around it on my paper.  I had started to draw again last year, and now I was more then pleased with the results.  I had practiced and practiced, and now I could use a graphite pencil just as well as my cans of spray-paint.
Hearing footsteps behind me, I quickly glanced over my shoulder, when I almost screamed in delight.  There behind me was that heavenly ray of sunshine that called itself a man, his Nile green eyes half-closed as he flashed perfect teeth in a crooked gin. 
    “You’ve grown,” he noticed as I stood to my full height in front of him, grinning from ear to ear.
    “You came back!” I exclaimed, resisting the urge to completely jump him in some sort of monstrous hug. 
    He gave a light laugh, ruffling his sandy-blond hair, when he noticed the sketchbook in my hands.  “Oh, may I see?” he asked, giving me a sly grin.  I just smiled back, eagerly handing over the black book.  He leafed though the pages, smiling proudly as he looked over each and every one of the drawings.  Some were what I had called “pretty” a year ago, while most were what I had called “grungy.”  I had decided that my artwork wasn’t going to hide the pain, instead it would proclaim it.  My art was my way to be free, to let my heart out, and that’s just what it showed.
    “See, you do have talent,” he said as he handed the book back to me.  I felt a light blush run over my cheeks, when he continued with a knowing smile, “So, how have you been?”
    I instantly thought back to the manila folders he had given me a year ago.  I kept up a content smile, replying, “Mel moved away at the end of the school year.  She didn’t want to go, but she had to.”  The man just kept smiling as I continued with a slight smile, “And only a few weeks after you left, my parents got divorced.”  I wasn’t sure if those photos in the folders were suppose to have changed anything or not, but I didn’t care. 
    “I didn’t ask about them,” the man suddenly said, giving a strange, knowing smile, “I asked about you.”
    I could have told him a dozen things.  I could have said that Mel had kept the picture and promised to never forget me.  I could have told him how we called each other every night and talk for hours on end.  I could have said how I managed to move on from mourning over Bailey and got a new dog.  I could have said how that once my parents had seen the photo of my mural, I finally told them about the subway tunnels.  I could have said that I found the courage to tell me mother I didn’t like all the dresses and ruffles and ribbon, and how now I went to school dressed as Max, not Maxine.  I could have said another twelve dozen things to him, but I didn’t.  Strangely, it seemed like he already knew them all.
    “Me,” I began slowly, “I’m perfectly happy.”
    The man just gave me a light smile, then handed me another manila folder, this time my own name written on the front in big letters.  I looked to him questioningly, and he nodded.  Slowly and carefully, I opened one end of it, pulling out a large piece of heavyweight paper.  I held the paper in front of my face as I gazed on in wonder.  The beautiful picture, done in fading watercolor and ink, was of a girl with long red hair sitting in the branches of an oak tree looming out over a small river.  She sat wearing a plaid jacket and baggy jeans, her bare feet skimming the surface of the water as she looked far out into the blue sky, when I noticed another person in the picture. 
    Just under the oak tree stood a young man, Nile green eyes narrowed slightly as he flashed a perfect smile, his sandy-blond hair moving with the slight breeze that lifted a few scattered leaves into the air.  He looked almost fading, as if he was just a shadow of a ghost leaning against the tree trunk as he looked up at the girl sitting in the branches. 
    “It’s amazing!” I breathed, more then stunned, but when I heard no reply, I lowered the paper from my vision, but found no one around me.  I quickly glanced around, looking for the man whom I didn’t even have a name for, but I was once again all alone in the empty park.  I turned with a bewildered “huff” to face the river, when I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye: just a shadow of a ghost with Nile green eyes and sandy-blond hair leaning against the trunk of the large oak tree.  But when I whipped my head around, all that was there was the faint wind lifting scattered leaves into the blue sky.
Just to humor myself, I glanced back to the picture, finding it just as it was the first time I looked.  I still didn’t have a name for the man, when my vision was pulled to the bottom right corner of the page, where only two red letters stood.  I gave a light smile, then tossed my head up toward the blue sky above.
    The initials were “J.C.”
    C’mon, who say’s God isn’t an artist?