Inspiration is a fickle flirt. He comes and goes, leaving my notebooks full of erratic bursts of passion. Sometimes I almost wish we had never met. I remember the first day; my thoughts were a collision of naivety and girlish impropriety. It was pen to paper and I lost myself in discovering the "inner" me.

Inspiration guided me blindly through heartbreaks and near self-destructions, preserving the sanity my mind so desperately clung to. But then there were other nights when I blared my music and lit some candles, but inspiration never came. I just sat in the dark, wide awake with hands of stone and a restless mind. Of course, inspiration always called the next morning, making sure I had survived the night, begging me to take him back.

Tonight I write not of Aristotle, or of Whitman, or of even my true love. Tonight I write not of wedding plans, or family tensions, or lack of creativity. Tonight I write because it is what I do. I write without purpose, or intention, or direction, or agenda. I simply write. I write not of song birds, or love stories, or philosophy, or religion. I write not of real love, or real events, or reality itself. I write not of fiction, or fantasy, or fairytales. I write not of freedom, for it is something a writer never truly tastes. Tonight I write because it is the only thing I need never explain. I write.

If consistency makes an artist,
then I shall never be one.

If it is pain,
then I once was one.

If it is love,
then why am I not still one?

Is true happiness not enough to fill an artist?

Is there more inspiration to be found in the dark- when there is nothing to see and everything to feel?

Has any artist ever been truly happy?

Must one suffer for their art?
More so, must art be a burden?
Then, was Christ, himself, an artist?

(My God, the burden he had to bear.)

Was Nietzsche right- that, poets exploit their experiences?

Why do we deprive ourselves of contentment, of sleep, of peace of mind?
Why do we **** our own bodies, poison our livers, starve our own souls in the pursuit of a muse?

We are, all of us, restless,
half-empty,
half-witted,
half-hearted,
fools,
that have fallen in love with pretty words.

Idolators, we are.

Sometimes, I wonder, if we're afraid that silence can ****.
Or that, if we're not screaming at the top of our lungs, we're not alive.

Idle pens are handicaps.
Idle minds- cancer.

We're all dying not to become utilitarians.
Ugly.
Artless.
lifeless?

We'll die just to hold onto the shadow of our own hopes and dreams.

If it is commitment that makes an artist,
then I shall never be one.

If it is wreck-lessness,
then I once was one.

If it is thoughtful articulation,
then why am I not still one?

I now know that,
I am not an artist.

I will not break my own heart.

I will not cut my own throat just to amplify my voice.