Muse

I fell in love with his eyes. Shining and pure, they saw the world through a curtain of awe and kindness. They softened at the sound of a child’s cry or a bird’s call. They wet at the sight of an injured calf or a wounded heart. They met my gaze with a longing known only to the most desperate of lovers.

He sang with a tongue cast in silver. His melodies could make a river swell and a stone weep. When he spoke, it was as if he created each word just for me to hear it. When he whispered my name, the world held its breath until he finished.

On the day I died, his eyes shattered. His tongue became lead. His hands lost their sense and the world became grey. That’s when he went looking for me.

I like to imagine the words he spoke to the ferryman, that he might ride for free. I hum a melody he could have used to lull the guard dogs to sleep. When I hear the echoes of sandals on stone, I wonder if his steps sounded just the same.

I was a shade when he found me. Formless, I wandered the desolation beyond life. I felt neither joy nor sorrow, but a yawning hollowness that longed for both. And then I saw his eyes. Ragged, weary, but just as beautiful as I remembered.

He told the tale of his journey to the place beyond darkness. His words spun out in waves and caught nearby shades in the undertow. We gathered in the endless dusk and he reminded us of the lovely pain of being alive.

The Lord Below took notice of this interloper. He descended from his throne and watched with curiosity. When the song was finished, he beckoned the poet to his chambers. A deal was struck. Something flared in my chest, then. Something almost like hope.

My lover would lead me from this place, back to the world. Back to myself. But he could not look at me until he did. All I need do was follow and trust his resolve.

Lead me he did. Through caves and corridors and darkness and fear. And I followed, step by careful step. The whole time, he sang. He sang of birds and rocks and water. He sang of me, of my beauty and kindness. Each word lent me enough strength for one more step.

The darkness receded. The cold ebbed away. I felt not only hope, but fear and sorrow and joy and a lovely kind of pain. My hollowness was almost full, almost brimming with everything left behind. I saw the sun, just over his shoulder. It whispered my name on a spring breeze.

My love had fallen silent. I readied myself for one final step.

And then I saw his eyes.

They were like the sea before a storm. They swelled and churned and stole the breath from my lungs. They looked at me in pain, in shock, in so many things felt only by the living. But nowhere in those depths did I find regret. In its place was the cold calculation of a poet finishing a song.

In that moment I felt unrelenting life and all the terrible pain it brings. A rage ignited in my chest as I stared into the eyes that once loved me. I could not voice the fire in my soul, so instead I prayed.

I prayed that the song now finished would melt his tongue and rot his teeth. I prayed that the words would drown every errant thought. I prayed that any ear bent to listen would hear only the shrieking anguish of a lover left behind.

And then he said my name. It was not a whisper. It was not a lyric. It was a promise. I would see them again, those eyes that damned me.

Life left me once again. I returned to the world of sorrow and cold. All I had left of him was a promise. And all he had left of me was a song.