Ink That Will Not Come Out

The workwear is dark blue and secondhand, and there is ink on it that will never come out — a green mark near the cuff, a black one across the knee from a night I was careless. I wear it to the print studio on the north side of the city, where the machines are loud and nobody minds if I stay until midnight.

I am an illustrator, which means most of my work happens alone at a desk. But four times a year I make a small edition of prints by hand, and those are the only days I use my whole body. I like it more than I am willing to say out loud.

The First Pull

The first print off the screen is always wrong. Ink uneven at the left edge, a spot where the emulsion has given up. I keep the bad ones in a folder marked where I went wrong. There are ninety-something of them now. It is, I think, the most honest thing I own.

Printing teaches you that a mistake made twice is a style.

By the tenth print my arms are steady and the counting disappears. Pull, lift, dry, repeat. The screens dry slower in winter. I eat convenience-store rice balls standing up, get ink on the wrapper, and eat it anyway.

What the Paper Keeps

What I draw and what the screen holds are never the same thing. The paper takes something away — a softness I had in pencil, a hesitation. For a long time I resented it. Now I plan for it. I leave gaps on purpose, the screen fills them badly, and that is the print.

I finish around eleven, forty-one good copies out of sixty. On the walk home along the river my hands still smell of solvent after washing. The cat, of course, is in the corner of every print, small and slightly out of register, as if walking out of the frame.