The muse is a
mysterious woman, pursued then waited for, enticed then pleaded with; until she
is loosed in our imagination.
She is sometimes
elusive and sometimes bold, declaring her presence.
She is in what we
see and hear and smell, and in what we taste and touch.
The muse is our
inspiration. She is everywhere — everywhere where there is a writer, or the
dream of being a writer.
She is in the heart
of every creator and in the culmination of every creative thought.
She has all the complexity
of a woman, and the
simplicity.
She is the simply
complex, mythological creature from which we derive our modern-day thoughts on
inspiration.
In Greek mythology,
the muses were the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, each possessing power that
could spark the creative endeavours of mere mortals.
A lingering sense
of mystery surrounds the inspiration we refer to as “the muse.”
The writer’s muse
is as individual as the writer.
What inspires you?
The muse may seem
at times unreachable, unattainable, intangible, ineffable.
But ...
Setting aside
history and the nine Greek mythological goddesses of inspiration, the
modern-day muse wants to be found.
Sometimes all she
wants is to be paid attention to. What is it about her that commands our
attention? What is that scent she wears, the one that beguiles? What is it
about the sound of her voice or the way she moves across a room? What does her
expression reveal about how she’s feeling or what she’s thinking?
What is it she
inspires in us, and why?
The writer’s work
is to place the reader, believably, where they are: to take the reader’s mind
and transpose it to another place and time where they will see what the writer
sees and hear what the writer hears ...
The writer’s muse
becomes the reader’s fulfillment.
Think for a moment
about what inspires you and suddenly you may be reaching for a napkin or
grabbing some scrap of paper to capture your creative muse. Or, you may find
yourself catching the tail of a conversation, like grabbing the tail of a comet
that streaks off with you through time and space.
Sometimes words
flow and thoughts and fingers scramble to keep up. That’s when you know the
muse has found you, and you follow willingly.
At other times, you
must go looking for her, perhaps while walking over trails and listening to the
snow crunch beneath your steps.
Or, she may come to
you in a scent — cinnamon — and a childhood memory rushes forward and propells
you to your keyboard or to paper, pen in hand.
The muse may appear
in someone you meet. Each person has a story, perhaps one that you will tell.
Sometimes you find
your muse; sometimes she will find you.
The muse is as
simple and as complex as that; as simple and as complex as writing itself,
which is both inspiration and discipline.