The striking of a key is an act of impermanent etching. Onto the motherboard, the obscured and mystified technology that operates inside the shell I have in front of me, the circuit compelled and completed by my act is gone just as it begins. All that remains, in some sense, is ethereal substance-less light. A burst of energy. Digital writing is all instant and only present. It has no guarantee of its future, much less its past. This scene of writing, then, is always hidden. On my laptop, it quite literally takes place beneath my hands, “below” my computer. The screen itself is a type of chamber – much like a painting, its depth is a trick of the eye. The difference between the screen and the painting is that I cannot see behind the screen. The lack of materiality, at a certain point, damages the illusion. What’s behind my desktop? What does the back of this icon look like?