Paul Cava. Untitled (Belatage). 2008. Pigment print composite (unique). 11 1/2″ x 27″.
How to endure under the burden of acknowledged despair: when that which was to raise him over the limits of the earth drowns him in the sea instead (a comic twist and reversal), when the only light is the gray light dimly perceived in a memory fading with age, scratched like an old silent film. The realization rises like a thickness in the throat and it too endures over days, nights, weeks, and all the years that are left to him. It all speaks to the tenderness of the body and the flesh which can scarcely stand beneath the weight. Then he is aware of the fragility of that flesh between the lethal weapons of memory and hope. In time the light to fade on him too when he is gray and aged. To open the mouth to breathe: then to drown. What remains behind: a mourning possibility, turned away.