4 Does art matter?

Quang and I leave Randy’s Candy. We walk past Oliver and the climate protest near the river. We even walk past Liam’s art gallery. (He is not in the window … and that makes me wonder: Where is he? What is he doing?)

Quang and I walk past the mural that says Keep Portland Weird! We walk past the Unipiper in the park. He is playing his bagpipes while tourists take selfies to post on Instagram. We walk past a tiny toy horse tied to a metal ring in the sidewalk.

I stop to look at the horse. It’s brown, but its tail is a rainbow of colors. I look at Quang. He does not seem impressed. I am not impressed, either. But I’m curious.

I bend down to look closer at the toy horse. I see a note tied to the horse. I open the note. This is what it says:

“A horse is a horse, of course, of course.
And this one’ll talk until his voice is hoarse.
You’ve never heard of a talking horse?”

“That’s not really a poem,” says Quang.

“How do you know?” I ask.

And then Quang begins to sing the words:

“A horse is a horse, of course, of course.
And no one can talk to a horse, of course.
That is, of course, unless the horse
Is the famous Mister Ed!”

“Who’s Mister Ed?” I ask.

“A talking horse,” he answers.

“Of course,” I say. That makes Quang laugh.

“It’s a song about a talking horse. His name is Mister Ed,” Quang explains.

Now I am beginning to think That Quang is weird!

“It was a famous TV show in the 1960s,” he says.

I look around. I think Quang is joking. He’s not. I Google it. It is true.

“Why does somebody leave a tiny toy horse tied to the sidewalk? Why does it have a note with the words from a song of an old TV show?” I ask Quang.

He replies: “Why do you post your poetry on every other street pole?”

Ha! I nod my head.

We arrive at our favorite park bench. This is where Alma is waiting. Alma and Quang are dating. They have been dating for more than 10 years.

Alma is a baker. She studies pies during the day. At night she plays a ukulele in a coffee shop at the university on the other side of downtown. She dreams of writing songs about falling in love, but she is afraid she does not know the subject well.

We say hello to Francisco. He plays music in the park during the day. At night he is an architect. He dreams of buildings that are upside down. I secretly believe that he made Quang’s umbrella. I want to ask Francisco if he ever made an inside-out building.

Instead, we sit and share the dandy shandy candy from Randy.

No one is brave enough to speak of their dreams today.

Except me. I say this with complete confidence: “I will be going to Paris very soon.”

They all nod, but they say nothing. I have said this before. I have said this many times before.

We sit in silence. I think about Quang’s invisible paintings. I wonder if I really see what Quang sees. Then I think about my poems. I wonder if Quang really understands what I write. Does anybody really understand art?

If people do not understand art, then does art matter? Does it matter if I write poems in Paris or Portland? Does it matter if I even write poems at all?

If nobody wants to read my poetry, then maybe I should give up.