A number of construction warning signs placed beside tall screens were misdirecting the public, giving the impression that the structure of the shopping centre was under repair. The discerning passer-by, however, might notice that the sounds that could be heard from beyond the awnings were soft. And if you took the trouble to prise the plastic sheets away from where they were attached to metal poles, you would see at once that the only work taking place was that of a mural artist.
Firstly, I gave the entire area of the mural an undercoat of lead white. This re-familiarised me with the surface of the wall, of how to turn the irregularities to my advantage. It also created a base that would reflect light and even when I painted over the white region entirely, if I had been skilful enough with how I prepared the paint, the reflection from the white undercoat within would add depth to any partially translucent outer layers. Then I set up my sketches on easels and reproduced them on wall, not stopping to adjust any errors but striking out as freely as possible to arouse the spirit of the mural: Hope.
After which Celine took over and I ceased to be in charge of the process. All I knew was that I was half-dreaming as I painted.
Blue sky; yellow field. Rothko does Ukraine. The Lady in Yellow is not perhaps utterly unexpected; she flopsrightdown among the daffodils and dandelions, reminding us ineluctably of nature and her naturalist, while that fretful fidget gadget of Neo’s on her head spawns images rarely seen now save when falling from the unfashionable dreams of some current practitioner of witchcraft: a palmtailed otter; the arbutus fruitflower leaf of the ableapple (symbolic of Hope as per the deciphery of Trinity College palaeographers); a seahorse, which, in its invincible Moomin insolence ever vain, seems to uncoil spirally and swell lacertinelazily before my eyes under pressure of the painter’s hand; the villain Rufus, Isolde where are you? Your tower then, on the horizon; three white basilica: a triangle of Lovelike sockets, insertions into which by the adventurous (reckless, drugfilled, orgasmic, careless, free) would electrify them with the outpourings of a wormhole universe; page fifteen of the Book of Kells; a child’s indefatigable toy cat, missing half a scratched blue eye, grey furmatted, yet felinebold; a voucher for World Book Day; the tooth of a megalodon; King Arthur knighting Parzival; the Mona Lisa; Abraham Lincoln’s hat; Dali’s melting watch; the pool cue that broke on my skull; the cover of Solo Leveling: Volume 8; an arrangement of whiskey tumblers on a green velvet bridge table; a unicorn birthday card from which a corner has been torn to bookmark said manga; a purple petunia seen through the 4,000 lenses of a bluebottle; a golden invitation to join Declan O’Rourke at Advent 7 Lodge, New Zealand; the gleam of the glow of the shine of the sun through the roofbox at Newgrange on the morning of the Winter Solstice…
‘Cyn, I hate to interrupt you, but it’s dark. You’ve been painting for eleven hours without a break.’
‘Thou rascal from Porlock, hold thy bloody hand.’
Then I staggered and Daniel caught me, bringing me to a plastic chair set up in the middle of the cloth that was spread on the floor before the mural.
‘Are you okay?’ My lover dabbed at the tears on my cheeks.
Still inhaling the sweet breath of Aphrodite, which had been exhaled via her palm to swirl around me, I leaned back with my eyes closed, basking in the love of the universe.
‘I’m okay.’
***
That night Celine came to me in a dream.
We meet at my most mellifluous, handing out leaflets outside the GPO. An attractive man wearing a charcoal suit – with a touch of grey in his matching hair – looks at me with knowing blue eyes. He agrees to come to my talk. Dreamtime folding into a later moment, I am speaking to a small audience and have a map of the world displayed on the touchscreen board behind me. It shows the islands owned by billionaires, ones that are outside the jurisdiction of any nation.
‘The wealth of just fifty people could feed, clothe, educate and provide clean water to everyone on the planet. Why don’t we take that wealth off them – still leaving them with a hundred million each for the rest of their lives – and use it for exactly that purpose?’
Nods. Smiles. Why not? It’s so simple. Like an unexpected twenty Euro note in your purse. There it is. Vorhanden.
‘Those fifty men fear the moment when a supersaturated state flips and some government attempts to tax them. In preparation for those they envisage as a pitchfork mob, the billionaires have created liminal spaces on planet Earth. Dr No islands. Realms of dark magic into which even Achilles would hesitate to enter, let alone a tax official. There, sharks and pet hydras are the least of the intruder’s worries.
‘The most well-attended seminars for the super-rich are no longer addressing topics concerning finance. Instead, they want to know how to keep their chief of security loyal. It is the bullet from their armed guards that is more likely to topple them from the heights than a summons to court from a land that has no dominion over their islands.’
Applause. Murmurs of approval. Then Celine puts his hand up, blue eyes still friendly.
‘Madam Speaker, doest thou believe in solidarity?’
‘I do.’
‘And, Madam Speaker, doest thou believe in honouring the creator?’
‘I do.’
‘And, Madam Speaker, doest thou believe a fellow Surrealist should be foremost among those deserving solidarity and honour?’
Oh no. My cry of despair tears the dream apart and although in recent nights the border between dream and wakefulness has become continent-sized I cross it swiftly.
‘What’s the matter?’ muttered Daniel, mostly asleep still.
‘The mural. I’ve made a mistake. I need to go there.’ It was Dali’s watch. Celine was right, Disrespect was my middle name. Or Plagiarist. I had to paint over the image right away.
Pulling off his DreamsAds hood and stretching, Daniel sat up. ‘What do you say, my love? A mistake? Surely, not from the hand that painted We Will Meet Again?’
‘The watch. Dali’s melting watch. I have to remove it.’
‘Why? Why that and not the Mona Lisa?’
Why not the Mona Lisa too? Having been kicked hard by Celine in my dream, I felt sure one was right and one was wrong. ‘I’m not sure I can express it in words. Dali’s watch is still alive. The Mona Lisa is.. reified? It has become a meme. It has dried out. The watch is still fecund. I have to remove it from my mural. Unlike the Mona Lisa, it’s not common property.’ I pulled away the duvet, ran to my pile of clean clothes, and selected a pair of jeans and a jumper that could be sacrificed to a day of painting.
‘This radiance that competes with the sun – competes, I say, not outshines, do not be roused to jealousy, Helios – has a name and within the brightness, a form. A dash of teal lace on warm, fawn hips. Discerning eyes and subtle lips. Cyn. Cyn. Cyn. Three times I utter that name.’
‘Are you going to join me later?’ I was already dressed and had reached the door. Yet I still felt that I was not hurrying quickly enough. Only when I had reversed my mistake would I cease to feel pangs of dismay.
‘I am. I’ll set up your dream and bring a QR code. You’ll have to paint it somewhere on the mural.’
‘I know.’
‘And Cyn?’
‘Daniel?’ I looked back through the door I had nearly closed behind me.
‘The hood is working. My imposter syndrome has melted away. With the help of my inner voice, I’m going to spend the morning writing. And I know it’s going to be good.’
‘I’m happy for you, lover. May your voice ring out like the trumpet of an angel.’
From Ringsend, I caught a 47 Dublin Bus. It was a carthorse of a bus, steady and patient, and would not hurry through orange lights, no matter how often I delivered encouraging taps on the back of the seat in front of me. Swapping to a 19 in the city centre I was amazed how few people there were on the quays and only then checked the time. 6.34am. Still, the spring day was bright already and it was going to be warm.
My next bus had a more flighty character, and sometimes stopped abruptly to let another bus through in front of us, and sometimes rushed forward into a tight corner out of a desire to experience a delicious swaying motion.
At last I was through the protective screen of the building site and into my painting space. Yesterday’s work was good, more than good, but I felt my mistake like a heavy weight on my chest. In the quiet before the centre opened, before even the staff had arrived to raise shutters and prepare their shops, I rubbed turpentine on Dali’s melted watch and when that scoured patch was dry, painted my own symbol of escape from agrilogistic thinking: a child-like tractor lifting off from the ground, emitting flowers and rainbows instead of diesel fumes.
Once again I relax while Celine takes over and, once again, I lose myself in sublinguistic realms where light beams of thought glide through the turquoise air like adverts for ‘Offworld’ in Blade Runner. I’m aware of what I’m painting: muscle memory guides my hand; free-association guides my ideas.
Expunged in an instant, my dreamworld collapsed, leaving me back in the world above as a result of Daniel having said, ‘Thus do I shed tears. And thus. For no one who is present before such beauty could fail to suffer from the thought of having to leave it.’
He really did have tears on his cheeks.
I put down my brush and restrained myself from hugging him because of the paint on my clothes. On tiptoes, I was able to kiss the salt water.
‘Is it finished?’
‘Ideally I’d spend the rest of my life adding a touch here and a layer there. Nevertheless, we can say it’s ready.’
His phone held a QR code. ‘Can you paint this somewhere?’
‘Bottom right.’
As I stirred a pot of white paint, Daniel sat in the plastic seat. ‘It’s magnificent. Playful. Hopeful. Such a glory of colour. Neo is going to sell a lot of DreamAds hoods as a result.’
‘That’s the idea though, isn’t it? To have millions of people join my dream?’
‘It is. I set the invitation for a week from now, midnight our time.’
‘Are we right to do this? What if releasing the id causes civilisation to collapse?’
‘Entrapping the id. Constraining it. Filling the mind with doom scrolling. Filling the mind with AI-generated content. It’s like an enormous, grey cloud is descending in all directions and the world is growing dark. Unless we try this, we’re doomed.’
‘You don’t know that. Awful as the world seems to be, it could get a lot worse and we could be the cause of disaster.’
‘I adore being able to hear from my id, don’t you? It’s like a light switch has come on. When I read a good poem now, I feel it in an utterly new and thrilling fashion. I can see the years of alchemical experiment that have gone into making a line exactly right, both in form and in meaning. I can see that the whole universe is imbued with life, right down to the subatomic level and that I am more than the sum of my parts. I feel connected. I want this for everyone, don’t you?’
‘Oh, certainly. And yet there is Amandus. I wouldn’t wish him on anybody.’
All that Daniel could offer by way of response was a shrug and I understood him. Ever since someone had first put on a DreamAds hood, humanity had entered a new era. All that could guide us in this strange, new realm was our own experience. In my case, Celine having chosen to be more explicitly in communication with me was entirely positive. I had learned so much from her; experienced so much through her.