Every creative soul requires
A certain set of friends.
Companions that will guide their pencils,
Paintbrushes and pens.
One needs small voices in their ear
Inspiring every work.
My closest of such friends are Liebe,
Elend and Ehrfurcht.

"Create a masterpiece,"
Says Liebe, sat beside my desk,
"That captures his fair image,
So perfect and picturesque!
Write down the thousand flattering words
Stored up within your heart.
Assign them rhyme and rhythm
As lyrical written art!"

"Spill out your pain and grief," says Elend,
"Onto a blank page.
Make image and analogy
Out of your fear and rage.
Must you release your anguish
As a scream into the sky,
I'll help to make it tasteful --
Pleasing to both ear and eye."

"Share with the world the light you found,"
Chimes Ehrfurcht, eyes aglow,
"That made you fall in love with living
And renewed your soul!
Discovery, courage, hope,
Glories of Heaven and of Earth!
Proclaim with verse and color
That which gives this life it's worth!"

Some days I seek their counsel,
And they're nowhere to be found.
Others, I'm nagged unceasingly
By these three voices' sound.
More helpful friends I cannot find
To aid me in my work.
My personal muses are Liebe,
Elend and Ehrfurcht.

I’ve met the night a hundred times—
She carries no remorse,
Her silver hand upon my chest
A silent, steady force.

Her breath is like a frozen hymn,
Too soft for earth to hear—
Yet chills my soul, and bends my will
Until it disappears.

I sought to end the endless ache
With shadows on the wall,
But shadows only shift and shrink,
And answer not my call.

There is no mercy in the stars,
No kindness in the frost—
Yet some persist to claim that light
Redeems what has been lost.

End me, then, O faithful dark—
Unbind this brittle form,
And leave me not to linger here
Through one more bitter storm.