He invented space anew,
painting subtle cubes in bright colors
flattened by a wide, gray light.

Critics called him the creator
of the modern age. He did not listen.
Shuttered from the trappings
of artistic success, he eschewed
the Parisian salon scene with its
sophisticated circles of envy and lies.

Fiercely perfectionist, he destroyed
canvases that fell short of his
extreme, exacting standards.
But he would always begin again.
The essence remained; only
the execution had faltered.

His art mesmerized many of
his fellow painters; they saw
the world with new eyes.
Yet he sacrificed the reactions
of others to achieve an impossible
incorruptibility of life and art.
They intertwined like a
double helix of DNA,
companion contradictions
seeking a final synthesis.

A cramped wooden door
in a rough stone wall in Aix-en-Provence
leads to his studio, a humble
hovel where modern art began.
We live there still.