Fifteen 02.27.10

I have had the fresh air in my lungs all day and still I am thirsting for it. It has been chill enough to wear a jacket, and my newly shorn hair has been revealing to me that when you expose yourself it sometimes takes getting use to. Just like I have been trying to get used to you not speaking to me, I can only guess at the reasons why. I am trying to get used to the fact that it may be possible you do not love me anymore, that you never will want me again, that you might even hate me somehow. I am also trying to get used to you not being in my life, but never far from my heart. Despite my unanswered fears, I am steadfast in that one thing alone. When everything else about me is changing, that is the one thing that remains constant, I have NEVER stopped loving you. I have NEVER stopped wanting you. I have NEVER thought for a moment about the possibility that you would never again be my muse.

No, you could NEVER stop being my muse. You will always be the thing that inspires me in all ways. You bring about the muse in me to grow, to change, to love myself better, to love others, to trust more, to embrace my life wholeheartedly and display my charisma unsullied by poor self esteem and unhealthy behaviors. You are the thing that inspires me each day to hope, to dream, to make my dreams manifest. I was wandering around before I met you worshiping cheap imitations of you. It is no small wonder they could not keep me inspired, they were not my true love. But now that I found you, and held you and called you mine you have transformed me into a muse-poet. A muse-poet falls in love, absolutely, and his true love is for him the embodiment of the Muse.

You are my Calliope. You are my epic lasting muse that brings out of me the sweetest lines of poetry I have ever been able to craft. You, whose gold crown blinds me as it sits atop the darkest curls, always a book in hand, a scroll of parchment, a quivering quill. It has been this way from the beginning, and so, it will never end. Even when my mind dried up and I could not summon words easily, all I could think to write about, all I could ever think to pen was you. You are the oldest and the wisest of the muses, and you are proving to be the most assertive in your silence. Do not fear, dearest love, do not fear for an instant that I would ever stop being inspired by you. I could never replace your seat in that throne. I would never be able to resist the allure of your beautiful voice, your eloquence, or your grace. Even years hence, I will still love you this way, the mere thought of you and the world comes alive with a torrent of creativity pouring from me. There are barely enough hours in the day, barely enough mediums for me to use to capture what I am inspired to manufacture when I think of you.

Even now, I am writing you tomes after your departure. I am paying reverence to a muse that no longer graces my waking life, only visiting in dreams. This absence stings in ways unknown and unfathomable. It is beyond pain, it is absence of the divine source. It is a life without the present spark of creativity. Why are you trying to morph into Mneme? Why do you cast me away and try to costume yourself with your sister Melpomène's mask? You know you cannot flee from me now that you have drenched my lips with droughts from your sacred streams. You cannot take back the gift of inspiration once it has been given. I am bound to you, you are my Calliope and I am your Homer. Each word I have written for you becomes another page in my rendition of the Odyssey.

This is my homage to you, my humblest of sacrifices. I have only this heart, and these words you stir within me to give you. I have only my love and devotion that stubbornly refuses to die despite the atrophy you try to induce. I have only these poor meager hands with which to craft you multitudinous works of art, each bearing your grace, each evoking some element of your wonder. They pale miserably when held aloft to your beauty. I do not wish to capture you, to hold you captive. I do not wish to isolate you and keep you as a possession. Rather, I wish to share you with the world and show them truly what inspiration looks like when it walks upon two feet. I want to show them your omnipotent ability to be a catalyst in the lives of others. What better example of these miraculous acts could there be than me? I am your adoring devotee, your humble servant, your unwavering pupil. I wait for your return, undertaking in the meantime a flurry of self transformation, so that when you return I will be reborn as an equal worthy of showing you I can love you in the ways you deserve and desire.

Still, sometimes I believe I am waiting in vain for you. Because I do not know what is in your heart, it sometimes makes it hard for me to hold onto hope. I remember what you have said to me in my darkest hours, about how you do wish to return, but that we should both take this time to grow. Do you remember what you said to me then, I wonder. Whenever I feel weak, whenever I am afraid, your words echo in my heart "I still believe we are meant to be together, just that that is not right now." And I am soothed. I believe in your insight. I too believe, that the Fata have declared we are meant to be together. Still, somethings do change. It is the only constant in this world: change. For so long I have railed against it, as if it was my bitter enemy. Now I see with new eyes, eyes you have opened for me with your rousing touch. I am no longer warring with change, instead I am embracing it as if it were a brother. I am working with it, to hone the tools I will need to work at my advantage. I wonder if you have abandoned hope. I wonder if you feel this is all too late for you and I. I wonder if you are just trying so hard, so very hard, to push me out of your mind, out of your heart with every second. I am sure though, some reminders remain, try as you might to replace me with new poets. I am sure that you are aware I still have love in my heart for your friends.

I know they told you they would be seeing me, I hope that this news did not cause you discomfort or pain. I hope you know that I esteem them as my own friends, and that I would not use them merely to get to you. I have tried to make that abundantly clear to them, and they trust what it is in my heart. I love them, they are remarkable people, and the fact that they have welcomed me into their hearts means I can't simply turn my back on them now. I am bonded to them, I will remain that way. I am sorry if that is difficult for you to bear. I don't imagine you will be prone to flights of jealousy over this, but in case you are, please let your mind be at ease. I do not wish to take them from you, or make an enemy of myself to you by remaining in contact with such good people as they are. I only wish to acknowledge my respect and kinship with them, to display that I care for them, even if you do not care for me any longer. I will not put them in the middle and I will not ask them to choose sides, you have no reason to fear there.

I heard you were worried about running into me today with them. I want you to know, I purposefully asked them to meet me away from your haunts. I have been avoiding those places on purpose. NOT because I do not wish to feel your aura and bask in its light. No, I wish to see you and speak with you again with EVERYTHING in me. But I am respecting your need for space. I am waiting for you to be comfortable enough to invite me back in, instead of invading and inserting myself against your will. I am praying you know, that even if you spoke to me, and honored the wish that we wish to be together again as lovers, I would not yet allow us to become weak and cave into the impulse. I would not allow us to rush back to that place of love until we were both ready to be in it and until you were able to see that I am changing and growing for the better. I would groom that trust slowly, cultivating it as best as I could. I would show you our wish to be together again would not stop the change that is happening, it would not return to the way it was before: broken and ill spent.

I hope you know, that could never happen now. I could never return to that place. I would never betray myself that way. I would never revert into the person I was just a month ago. That person is dead to me now. 15 days seems like nothing, I am sure. But if you doubt it, read these letters. I am changing more and more every day. My every effort is surely focused on growth. I NEVER want to return to that place of isolation and grief. It is a place I was hiding in for so long, a place I was keeping myself prisoner. I am now free of that toxic mindset, I am seeking my fulfillment and my health. I can only hope that you are doing the same.

My dream is that we each use this time as we said we would, to grow and change in ways that are truly healthy for ourselves. I am hoping we are both on that path and that it leads us back to each others hearts. I wish you would know, I will not sway from this task. I wish you would know, I will never yield again to accepting self defeating limits that drive me away from evolving. I wish you would know, I am as adamant about this journey as I am about one day having children. My drive is sure and certain and now that it has begun, it will never ever cease. There is nothing that will quell this determination I have to grow well and surpass my previously imposed limits. There is nothing that will drive me away from becoming better so that I can love you with everything in me the way I am learning to love myself. I will never abandon this quest, it is as I have said my Odyssey.

My muse, my sweet Calliope, grace me with your voice once more. Reach out to me, send me a missive so that I have a window into your heart. I will not take it as a sign of weakness, I will not take it as a sign of total forgiveness. I wish only to know your mind and if your heart still sings with my name within it. Do you still wish to return to me someday? Will I know your grace once more?