A Response: Declining Temptation

I’ve never really wanted a muse.

I write constantly — while wishing myself to sleep at night, driving into town on my Honda Dream, my mind perpetually mouthing out phrases — and it seemed that having to ponder the will of a muse would only complicate things. Sometimes my prose is lovely, sometimes it’s flat — I’ve only myself to hold responsible.

But last week, I had second thoughts. If my muse were a real person, would it be different? Ever curious to try something new, I wrote a letter in the hopes of tempting Tree, Matthew‘s muse, to be my muse for the day.

Below, find her response; perhaps I am relieved to stand by my muse-less instincts…

Dear Zoë:

After much deliberation, I have chosen to reject your earnest and enticing proposal to function as your muse for a day. I will confess that I was nearly swayed by your sleep-giggling anecdote, for I myself enjoy a similar nocturnal peculiarity. I have been inclined to write on my body in unintelligible, Cyrillic-looking characters during sleep, especially while ill. I first experienced this at the age of fourteen, when I awoke to find some four-letter enigma scrawled across my abdomen in purple ink. The pair of us would make any sleepover an entertaining event, it is certain!

I must admit that after spending the last several years as Matthew Dryden’s muse, I remain unconvinced of my true merit as such. In all honesty, I have only just begun to settle into this significant role of mine. For some time, I harbored resentment of the term, fearing I was doomed to a life upon a shelf, a creature to be gazed upon and admired but not heard or held. I thought, “I’m a writer! I should have a muse, not be a muse!” Since Matthew is obliging and carries his muse in his pocket, he has unknowingly tamed this notion out of me, and I have begun to view my position as a favorable, if not flattering, one.

In Matthew’s denial of your request to borrow me, he gifted you quite a courtesy: a living, wayward muse is often far more trouble than she’s worth. I am unforgivably prone to periods of insolent capriciousness, to the point of habitual desertion. Matthew may say that I am always with him, which is not untrue, but ask him how many times I have vanished without so much as a fare-thee-well, how many times I have vowed never to speak to him again, how many times I have sat in unexplained silences, seething, sulking or smirking.

Although you’ve only petitioned for a day or so of my company, I can promise that, were I to agree to the exchange, I would abandon you at least once. It’s what I do. But even in the breadth of my abeyance, you would still find me sneaking glances at you around corners, eyes veiled by Jackie O.-like sunglasses, black hair hardly hidden by a scarf. I would spit feeble threats in your direction as you passed, your gaze set determinedly forward, muse forgotten. Perhaps I’d even be reduced to name-calling, concealing hexes in coughs, but to your ears my voice would register as only a trick of the wind. Whirling in a paroxysm of pique, I would stomp after you, cursing, fists and jaw clenched comically. My cries of “Oh, the gall of you!” would cause an entire city to turn and gawk with mouths agape, but still you’d walk on ahead, untroubled.

Now you must certainly see that you are better off without a muse, particularly one whose petulance rivals that of a fussy housecat. Perhaps someday you will acquire a muse better suited to you, but until then, I wish you the best in all of your undertakings, solitary and otherwise.

Sincerely Matthew’s,
Tree/Ellie Lane/Lindsay Elaine