X-ray reveals hidden artwork behind Picasso painting

Do we strip off the Picasso paint and keep what’s underneath?

Naturally, the crucial consideration is, which would be worth more? I’ve done a quick poll.

Poll results:

• 20% – Strip it down because then it would be “the painting that got stripped of its precious Picasso painting just for this trash,” which would be worth a lot.
• 31% – Keep the Picasso because then people would always be asking you to strip it down so they could see what’s underneath and it would be worth more that way.
• 15% – Strip it half down, so people could see some of both paintings and then say that their five-year-old could do better than either.
• 34% – Just don’t give a damn

Revelation

 

My wife and I were raised in homes that believed in modern-day revelation. Our lives were organized in important ways around revelation.

In the bustle of modern life, away from our childhood religious communities, we slowly lost our faith. We came to miss the guiding hand of revelation. We felt rudderless, if I may mix my metaphors.

So we decided to provide revelations for each other. If the candle was lit, a written revelation was to be found under it.

We got off to a rocky start. To my wife it was revealed that she’d look better as a blonde, and wearing four-inch heels around the house might be a good idea, especially near bedtime. To me it was revealed that I was a jerk. That nobody likes me, including my wife.

To my wife it was then revealed that I’d be stopping at the Pole Heaven Lounge on my way home after work. It was revealed to me that if another car was in our driveway, I was to just keep on driving.

More revelations followed, until the candle began to assume some of the blame. Our experiment ended when the candle burnt down our house.

Now we are homeless. No candle, but we decided to continue with the revelations, in the belief that knowing is better than not knowing. Ignorance is not bliss in our case, but longing.

Now, if one of us finds the spread-out front page of a free newspaper covering our shopping cart, underneath it will be a revelation scrawled on butcher paper with a pencil stub, emphasizing love and forgiveness. Not necessarily of each other but, you know, avoiding the truth.

 

For Weekend Writing Prompt

Secret Love

my mind and the world
the future becomes the past
secret love abides

 

For Heeding Haiku

Desire

That look in the wolf’s
eye may be caused by moonlight
but it’s not desire

 

For In Other Words

Our President’s Flower: The Wild Rose

dawn dew on wild rose
our president reaches out
and thorns prick his hand

 

For Frank’s Haikai Challenge

Courage

“It takes a lot of courage to be a courageous person,” my dad would say.

“It takes courage to have courage?” I would say.

“It does and you don’t,” he would say.

“I don’t have the courage or I don’t have the courage to have the courage? Which one are you talking about?”

“Both of them, Son, I am sorry to say.”

“Well now, hang on. Suppose I just up and admit I’m a coward, right now, to you. Would that take courage? To stand here and admit it to your face?”

“Hmm… Is that what you’re doing?”

“No, I’m just asking. It’s not like running into a burning building to save a baby, but it would take some grit to make such a confession to your own father, wouldn’t it.”

“I was not calling you a coward, Son. You are a feisty one. Courage takes some of that too, I guess.”

“Well, all right then,” I would say.

 

For the Daily Prompt.

Train Platform

She fussed with her stuff. Piled it on the platform like that. First train along, she was off.

 

Photo by Frank McKenna via Unsplash
For Only 100 Words