THE DIVER the tomb lid sketch a naked man his body arched to curve against the arc his fall accomplishes they say it is an image of an old belief life is one long fall death a gravity the wise make beautiful yielding as if willing here the body's weight is image of soul's fate and life an action only partly willed an arc that anchors in a swell of wine-dark mystery was he who lay beneath the slab as beautiful as that diver or was he simply rich enough to be depicted so? I hope they paid him well the one who painted it I mean for we who stare upon it now can give him nothing but our late appreciation useless as it is to him