Seeing into and through the illusions of art| MARK HUGHES COBB

Once upon a time there was a fish who thought it was a woman; or a woman who dreamed of becoming a fish, only to wake in an atmosphere suffocating, constricting, disenabling.

So this discontented, unenchanted creature — call her A, for appetite, for ambivalence and ambiguity — daily went swimming along, because what other choice, really? Gliding, undulating, admiring its sheen as light refracted from above, first golden, blue and amber for portions of a day, then silver, grey and sable through the span of an evening.

And one wave of light turned to another, particles falling colder then coldest, warming and warm again and boiling. One moment much like another, because what's time to A. Fish, or A. Person who longs for the languid life aquatic?

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Until that bit when everything changed, as a wizard stumbled along the shore, not yet knowing he was looking for a fish who wished to become a woman. This wizard served a king, not one of those feral and shady ones, not one who drools to perch atop piles of gold and conquest, blood and bones, not one who rose to top dog via accident of birth, but an actual decent monarch, such as typically only thrived between book covers, as the other kind of king would typically wipe this sort of simp off the map in minutes.

But this OK king had grown old, because what other choice, really? While the wizard grew younger, as one of those kinds of magical beings. In his highness' concern to make safe and better the lands, to ensure all the people prospered — Because who can pay taxes if they're not raking in the geld themselves? — he'd forgotten one vitality: Love. Family. A wife. A descendant. An heir. Someone to share in the quest to become worthy of a crown.

The wizard wished to find such love for his king — let's call him Wart, as in T.H. White's "Once and Future King" books, to keep the idea in mind that maybe, even as a decent dude, he wasn't such a great catch — because he knew which side his manna was buttered on. That quest wasn't as simple as it may sound, even for a wizard. Think of him on a scale between Merlin and Neville Longbottom. Powerful, but not a legend. Like junior faculty, with a running contract, but no tenure. Yet.

Because the wizard believed in creating a utopia for the future that was his past, should this king's ideals catch on. So what or who should the wizard — let's call him Mal, because foreshadowing — seek? Something like Lady Macbeth, but perhaps not so quick to dash brains out. Like Alice, only matured. Hippolyta, but sans negative histories with demi-gods giving rise to justifiable distrust. Arwen, though a better actor.

Mal thunk and thunk 'til his thinker was sunk, resting his tootsies in cool waters, where something nibbled at him. A concept arose.

On fire with creation, Mal apparated with a flash into Wart's presence, causing not a little soiling of trunks among the assembled court. This midnight, on the shores of the lake, Mal would produce a wife fit for a Wart, beautiful and kind, hair golden, red or ebony depending on viewpoint, strong and tall — though not taller than the king — and wise, though not letting on she was smarter than Wart and Mal combined, because, well, she was perfectly wise to these guys.

"As long as you love her, you will be king," Mal predicted, or rather, tormented.

So the wizard cursed the king with knowledge. Had he simply produced two-legged A one day, announcing her as some princess from Far-Away Land, what would be the harm? If it quacks, waddles and straddles 15th Street in desperate dashes from Forest Lake to Cook Out for day-old fries, it is most likely a waterfowl from the family Anatidae. Wart suffered knowing that A was not what she seemed.

Much as A's bubble burst on the surface of moon-shattered waters, the illusion wore thin to the point of insubstantiality, until with a pop like the sound of a gust across a teapot, the king fell.

All art is illusion, smoke and mirrors confabulated to tell stories, looking at what we can't see but can only intuit, what we ultimately fail to interpret as skillfully as the purity of the nascent notions in our hearts and minds.

The Wachowskis have made a mint in this material world by positing we're trapped in a matrix, that everything we think that we know is illusion, beyond control. Only knowledge can liberate. Once awareness of the divine spark within can be felt, understood, revealed, scattered and smothered, then scales would fall away and purity could reign.

Or, like the king, you could fall crazy-go-nuts.

The Wachowskis, and Philip K. Dick, Tim Powers, and any number of fantasists who attempt to probe other realms, dance somewhere in line with Gnostic — from the Greek "gnosis," meaning knowledge — philosophy, which believes an all-powerful being must exist entirely outside this universe, incapable of creating such a flawed existence.

Gnostic thinkers posit a second creative power, the demi-urge, a slightly sinister antagonist, pitting flesh against soul, darkness against light. It's tempting, because that creator would make this whole — well, just look out your windows — much easier to explain. The idea of an all-powerful benevolence who allows pediatric cancer, just to pluck a hideous awfulness off the top, does not compute.

The question posed by Mike Leiber and Jerry Stoller: "Is That All There Is?" Peggy Lee (in her role as interpreter/narrator) suffers a house fire, finds disappointment in the "greatest show on earth," falls out of love, and addresses the most high awful, pondering if life is such a loss, why not leave? She answers:

"Oh, no, not me, I'm not ready for that final disappointment. ... If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing/Let's break out the booze and have a ball...."

Which suggests she took the red pill, and after seeing through all the veils, went right back to blues, which historically do but medically don't mix well with booze.

Dionne Warwick pondered, via Burt Bacharach and Hal David, "What's it all about?" in the song written for 1966 flick "Alfie." The titular cad — Michael Caine, earning his first of six Oscar nominations — a bounder, cur, louse, lout, rotter, stinker, worm, behaves as if no one and no thing matters but him. He breaks hearts, betrays pals, fathers a child but refuses to take responsibility; contracts cancer, goes insane, picks up a hitchhiker and brawls with her boyfriend, impregnates the wife of one of his few friends, watches on as she aborts the fetus in his flat, then tries to fall back on old loves, though by now they've recognized his ghastly nature, and yes that all happens in one hour and 54 minutes.

Three-hour Marvel flicks don't pack as much action, though they focus more on the worthy than the worthless. The MCU takes an optimistic view, while I fear too much of our matrix-realiity falls in line with Alfie's.

Warwick's velvety croon softens, suggests this can be a story of redemption — though, wow, that's a long tangled forest before a happy after — with the idea Alfie might be coming around to life's sole and soul salvation.

Peanut-butter cups.

Or love: "And if only fools are kind, Alfie/Then I guess it's wise to be cruel...."

Jackson Browne probably wasn't studying the Gnostics when he wrote "Fountain of Sorrow." Judging by the "Late for the Sky" cover, he was under the influence of Magritte on repeat. He starts with a photo, freezing a woman at a moment, catching childish laughter by surprise, while a trace of sorrow remains in her eyes:

"When you see through love's illusions/there lies the danger."

I know more than three women who've dreamed of becoming mermaids, and yes, probably they're flashing back to childhood, a family visit to Weeki Wachee. Maybe they're making it up, but then "made up" is everything, every story, painting and song. Every photo and portrait freezes into frame a perspective. We live with such illusions.

Reach Tusk Editor Mark Hughes Cobb at mark.cobb@tuscaloosanews.com, or call 205-722-0201.

This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: Seeing into and through the illusions of art| MARK HUGHES COBB