The new mantra
Find a shelter
How easily demanded by those in power
Stay there
Open yourself to alone
Become someone else now
Someone who can live
Without order
Or places to go, who had work
And friends
A fabric of interaction
Of Meaning, that you didn’t have to construct
From inside you
Moment to moment
Had a life with appointments
Routines
Structure
We artists know that country,
The landscape of alone
Push ourselves inside where
Alone and lonely stare at each other
Over empty canvas
Or blank page
We have learned how to
Survive
On air,
How to live as if there is no tomorrow
How not to notice if we skip a meal
Because we cannot pull away
Since the beginning
Since the cave
We drew on walls
With charcoal
From the fire
With color from the berries
Shelter in place
We know how to do that
Our place is inside us
Enough turmoil, angst, love
To fill a universe.
—Marian Roth
