Complicit in Stillness

That doesn’t exist,
Except as gods do,
As their names, as us.

Photography is
Complicit in this,
Statuary, too.

Paintings, just a bit.
But words worst of all.
We name what isn’t

Which is just what we
Really almost are
And certainly seem—

Still, a lie. The best
Of lies, immortal,
As if. Still, we lie.