Why do We Write?

“Beauty will save the world.”1

-Dostoyevsky

If we accept that art helps us reveal
The hidden structures of the universe                  
As beauty transcendent in color and form
Harmonious truth in music, word, and dance

Then choosing sides in old men’s deadly games
Is merely empire-building, trunkless legs2,
And focusing upon our hurts and harms
Is but a dark Endorian3 conceit

If we build art in love, not for ourselves,
But for all others, we live beyond all time

1 Prince Myshkin in The Idiot
2 Shelley, “Ozymandias”
3 1 Samuel 28