Sunday, October 20, 2013

Awaiting Erato

(Study of a blank page).

Alone again, what is Muse?
What kind of entity
as light as breath, heavy as guilt, capricious as faith
that holds me in such crushing torpor
of impatient anticipation.
Be she young, or she at all?
who points my gaze, loosens my tongue
and sets ablaze my thoughts,
before, with scant indication
gone.
If a he, Muse is brutal
a fierce prodigal who bears no kindred spirit
no brotherly bond
and will not fight my corner,
who lashes cruelly with barbed whips
that rip the sleeves of my recoiling aspirations.
No, Muse is she
who, tosses tendrilled locks
with a curious, unsure countenance,
the promise of a smile, the treason of a frown,
the blink of embrace, the furnaces of loss,
why else would I wait here?

© Graham Sherwood 10/2013

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