Love Is Pretty Dumb

For Valentine’s Day, my mother sent me a bag of marshmallow hearts with pink outlines. They’re not very tasty but they do provide good fodder for a still life.

I was thinking about Cy Twombly's painting, Leda and the Swan,  with recognizable heart shapes and dicks and frantic, aggressive paint strokes. I've seen Leda and the Swan in person at a major museum, I believe I went with other family members and one of my cousins. She didn't understand abstract expressionism but she did understand the hearts and violent strokes.

Hearts can certainly be cliche, just like Valentine's Day, unless you do it just right.