“Beauty will save the world.”*

-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 legs†,

And focusing upon our hurts and harms

Is but a dark Endorian‡ conceit

If we build art in love, not for ourselves,

But for all others, we live beyond all time

 *Prince Myshkin in The Idiot

†Shelley, “Ozymandias”

‡1 Samuel 28