Inspiration
The cursor winks at me, constant, mocking.
I stare forlornly at the white virgin snow of the page awaiting the footprint that will begin the journey. I’ve been in this room for six long weeks, feeling it slowly shrink as I battle with myself. A paragraph here, a line there, an idea scribbled then discarded angrily onto the overflowing pile of rancid detritus in the corner. Trying so hard to will a spark to ignite, to grasp at something from the very air around me.
Before she left it had been so easy. I would wake, ideas pounding through my head. With steaming coffee at my side I would sit and the words would flow from my fingers as water from a tap. The ever increasing mountain in the ashtray marked the passing of time. She would stand quietly in the doorway, watching me at my desk, alone, as the hours passed me by. I would fall exhausted into her warm soft arms at night knowing that my dreams in the darkness were destined to become my words in the daylight.
The days stretched into weeks and then months. The end was tantalizingly close, always just a hair’s breadth away. People were waiting for me to finish; I couldn’t stop. Meals taken in silence as I re-read past chapters, made notes and corrections. I never saw the tears cloud her eyes as decisions were made, the tightness of her mouth as she willed herself to act. I saw her as I saw the bed, as I saw the chair; simply blurred items that I would pass, day by day at the edge of my consciousness.
I awoke to her pain the same day I awoke to her note.
My imagination has drifted away through the open door that she left. My words are my lifeblood, they feed and clothe me. I prostitute myself for the adulation of the faceless. Without them I am nothing. The checks that once fell like autumn leaves through my door have become as scarce as the ideas that gave them birth.
I chose this place to be free of distraction, free of the phone calls and the endless e-mails always wanting to know what was next, wanting more. Never content with what I’d given, just what I had left to give. I thought alone, unbothered I could find peace, find myself again and it would come again. But instead of a place of serenity, an oasis in the whirling maelstrom that is my life, it has become an anchor around my neck dragging me down into the depths of my own self-loathing.
A lone window provides the only view to the needful world beyond. I peer through the murky glass to the life outside. A river snakes through the valley off into the distance. Would that I could follow. Above the hills the grey-white clouds drift slowly across the sky, icebergs floating across an endless sea. I can hear the songs of the birds as they soar overhead. A smile touches my lips as I admire the simple beauty.
A glimpse of red above the fence line shakes me from my reverie. Someone is coming. My heart starts to thunder in my chest, sweat soaks my hands and blood crashes through my head. I told them I needed space, time to finish. I can’t be rushed. I swallow against the dryness of my throat and try to slow my breathing, to calm myself as I realize it is simply a hiker, nothing more. Some company may be what I need, inspiration to smash through this mental obstruction. Wiping my hands on my trousers I pick the breadknife from the table and reach for the door.
With the staccato drip of the coffee machine in the background and the cigarette smoke billowing gently up from the crammed ashtray I glance over at the bloodied rucksack in the corner and at my silent friend. My fingers fly across the keyboard.
