Around about a month ago I was at a graduation party for my friend, small thing, warms smiles, hugs all around, everybody had accepted the summer; for what it was. The party was rather a snooze for all I cared until a couple of my friends sought me out for some good old bookworm talk. It was a very enlightening moment, sitting there in stagnant heat, itchy with mosquitoes and God only knows what other kinds of insects, talking about literature. The three of us spoke of genres, favorite authors, and writing styles. Ah, there it is, the infamous writing style.
So our conversation had spilled over into a familiar yet all the same foreign territory. Expressing oneself through writing. The two of them, eager as ever to hear what I thought about the stories they're composing. What did I think? Interesting? Is there potential? How do they find that inspiration? I've been a poet and a writer for many years, and did not want to admit that I too had the writer's block. Terrible thing, awful thing. I found myself caught in the middle of a novel that I absolutely knew had potential, stuck. Anyone who asked about it, gladly I could tell them the beginning and the middle and the end, but how do I get there? It is like being caught with an illness or trapped in a web, one senses a need, an urge to create but without a muse, there is nothing. I had been wracking my brain for weeks, nothing written, not a single poem, what was wrong with me?
My friends were hopeful about their work, but there was no source for their ideas to filter from. They asked me about such technicalities, the plot, the characters, the language. Yet they failed to realize that none of that really matters without that muse. When the words flow out of your soul as water does from a water fall. There is no comparison! Once one has found that source, they become unstoppable because not a single thing can get in the way. I was morbidly dreadful about the matter, that I had lost this.
The days mulled over, I tried writing but only scribbles ensued, I sat at the computer; nothing. I was far too distracted, I feared my gift would be lost forever. An unsettling idea. And then he came. This guy, this old friend, this old lover. He came back to me, after a year of silence. I was absolutely flabbergasted, no other words could describe such a sensation. This person who I clung to for years like a crutch, fell out from underneath me a year ago, and now he was back. Oh I was delighted to catch up with him! We tried so hard to avoid talking about the conflicts and circumstances, tried bottling them up. Of course, nothing stays confined forever and in this scenario exploded all too quickly.
He told me, "My lover, Angi. I have to leave, and I cannot come back this time." I won't bother explaining the details, because there is an overwhelming amount. But I was heartbroken, everything in the world felt meaningless. As though the Sun came crashing down upon the Earth to burn everything into a smoldering sight. He left a cavity in my chest.
Then I awoke, and realized that I was liberated. Stricken with grief, all kinds of emotional pain yes, but liberated. I never wanted to write a poem so badly in my life, and then more and more and more. A week has passed, and I have barely put down the pen and the paper. The creative flow has been continuous, I've been finding inspiration in everything I see. He freed me, my muse. I've found it and I never want to let it go.
Some people wander their whole lives, desperately searching for inspiration. Driven by an overwhelming feeling, undiscovered artists are left unable to express themselves. For quite sometime, I found myself under that very spell; hungry for an outlet, starving for a spark to end my tragic writer's block, a muse, anything. Until very recently, within the past week or so it revealed itself to me once more, and how utterly relieved I felt. Remarkable.
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