My Muse is Mute.

In months gone past, my Muse was vocal.  She did not whisper so much as speak.  Her words were soft, but easy to hear when I let myself sit quiet.

In days gone past, her voice has stopped. I hear only echoes.  Instead she slides into my soul and directs me in silence.  Her pull has lead me to knit, to bake, and even to sew.  Perhaps I’ll wake up tomorrow and feel her pulling me towards my beads.  She is fickle, is my Muse, and sad does this make me.

Where months ago, I saw the rhythms and patterns form into words, I see them now in strings.

 Forgive my silence.  It echoes here, I know.  My Muse pulls my attention away to other things and I cannot help but to express her voice.  Sometimes it appears in script; at other times it finds its way into the click and slide of a needle or a brush.  Sometimes the pencil moves to form not words but pictures.  Sometimes the paint forms a scene rather than it’s description.

She has a short attention span, and still I soldier on.  I try to find the ways to satisfy her song.  From paint, to sketch, to dance, to beads, to knots and wireworking…she seems to like to make of me a jack of many trades but not destined to be a master.

It all starts with a Muse.

I’ve joked in the past that my cat, Terpsichore, named for the Greek Muse of Dance, is my muse.  If that were true, this would undoubtedly be titled “My Muse Bites Often” instead.  The fact is that my Muse, that inner creativity that draws me to write, is much too easy to ignore.  She whispers softly, often seductively, insinuating ideas into my head.  Since becoming a mother, it’s all too easy to ignore her gentle gifts.  I have lost my ability to recognize her, unless there is something heavy on my mind which only she can help me resolve. 

My children are older, now.  My daughter is nine and my son is three.  They entertain themselves and each other more often these days without needing my direct guidance or interference.  I have begun to feel the hushed pull of My Muse again.  She and I tried making jewelry with beads and stones and wire.  It was enjoyable, but it did not give voice to the feelings that the Muse and I needed to express.  We tried things like crocheting, and even painting.  Neither was adequate to the task.  And so I began to once more explore the world of writing, with my Muse insistently dropping words and ideas into my lap, if I were just quiet enough to hear them.

She used to speak much louder, or I was much better at listening, back in the days before marriage and children.  There was always some new idea spawning from my body then.  I wrote. I made collages.  I painted and drew.  I used Sculpey to make statues and beads.  I danced.  Oh, how I danced.  My Muse loves the rhythm and movement of dance.  It translates well into words.

It will take me time to re-learn how to listen to my Muse.  Her shy whispers take practice to hear.  By sitting down here to write, I am giving her my attention and focus, and allowing her the peace she needs to be heard.  My Muse speaks softly.  I must learn to listen again. 

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