Summoning the Muse

My husband shudders every time I tell him this. He stops hammering a nail into our new shed. “Please, dear, can’t it wait?” he asks.

“No,” I say, “the feeling is upon me. I must summon the Muse.” I note that leaves have covered the back yard. I’ll ask him to rake the leaves when he’s finished with the shed.

“If you must,” he says. “I know what this means. Tell me when you’re done.”

He bows his head in acquiescence, and he continues to hammer. I set about my ritual. A year ago, my ritual had 100 steps. I have narrowed it down to 10 steps, 10 easy steps to assure that the Muse will come and inspire my poetry.

1. First is Self-Care. I bathe in warm water in our upstairs bathtub. Soap bubbles

are required. I scoop the water and the soap and blow the bubbles in the air as I chant, “Come, O Muse. Come to me.” I roll around in the tub until all of me is wet and clean. I pour shampoo on my hair and rub it in. After half an hour of this luxury, I run more water and wash the shampoo off my hair and the rest of my body. With two towels I dry my hair and my body. I know in my heart that woke up the Muse, though more was required before I could begin to write. I dress and prepare myself for the second step of the ritual.

2. Second is Giving to One Who Cannot Give Back. 

I set out the ingredients and place them on the counter. I grab the cookie pan, bowls, and mixer. I cream butter and shortening, then add sugar, beating until fluffy. “Come, O Muse,” I say, as I gather eggs from the backyard. Back inside, I mix in the eggs and vanilla until it’s smooth, then toss the shells. I sift flour, baking soda, salt, and cream of tartar. I preheat the oven to 400°F and gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet, stirring. I mix sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl, then roll one-inch dough balls in it.

My husband comes in and dips a finger into the batter, licks it, and gives a thumbs up before heading back to work. I space the dough balls on a baking sheet and bake for eight minutes. “Be pleased, O Muse,” I say as the delicious smell fills the air. My cat strolls into the kitchen, her nose wiggling. I shoo her away. I pull the pan out to cool on a wire rack as I sing my cookie song:

Cookies, cookies, sweet as can be

Cookies, cookies, be good to me

. 

When the snickerdoodles have cooled, I place them in a plastic container (I leave one for my husband), and I walk the six blocks to Auntie Gladys’s house. Gladys, a widow, isn’t my aunt, but everyone in the neighborhood calls her “Auntie,” so I do too. 

I ring the bell and listen as she shuffles to the door and opens it. Her eyes light up when she sees me. “Emily! How nice to see you. Come in.” She opens the door wider, and I step into her living room, which is crowded with antiques, memorabilia, scrapbooks, dusty diaries, paperback novels, leftover meals, and two territorial cats.

As usual, the living room is warmed to an uncomfortable level, but I never say anything about the heat because Auntie is satisfied with her surroundings. I give her the container, which she sets on her antique coffee table. “It’s a poetry day,” I tell her. “I’m calling the Muse.”

“Wonderful!” she says. “You are such a dear. Would you care for a glass of water or a cup of tea?” I tell her that water would be fine, and when she returns with the glass, I suggest she open the container. Her eyes pop when she sees and smells the snickerdoodles. We share them like we are two kids in a kitchen after school. We lick our fingers, smack our lips, and laugh about old times. The snickerdoodles disappear.

3. Love Words

A poet must love words for the words’ sake.

I read the opening sentence in James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake: “"riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs."

I write in stream-of-consciousness: Matterhorn, early morn, days of scorn, pages torn, Scatterbrain, smatterbrain, snatterbrain, scatter my pain, stutter in Stuttgart, Mad Hatter brain, Sad Catter, Rad Ladder, bad adder, sad chatter, tad tattered, tadpole flattered, pole matter, epigastric Rick, epic septic, cruel gruel, pole vault, slow halt, show malt, flow to Galt, low Peralta, not my fault.

4. Love Rhythm

da dum da dum da dum

da dum da dum da dum

da dum da dum da dum

5. Love Rhyme

A poet must love rhyme, so I write some rhyming lines as follows:

Heartbreak mistakes that ache

Some make love, some take love, some break love

He said, I miss your kiss, Miss

Some wise up, some buy up, some cry up.

6. Love Music

A poet loves music, so I play a cello piece and a Beethoven symphony. I play along with my kazoo. Fortunately, my husband is outside at the shed. If he heard my kazoo, he would shriek.

7. Be an owl

Listen, listen, listen. Then say “Who?” If you fall off your branch, you’re a bad owl. I bound around the living room as a I say, “Who? Who?” 

My husband comes in for a glass of water. Seeing me, he shakes his head and goes back out.

8. Break a sweat

A poet must be in shape, so I run to the store for more sugar and cinnamon. I’m not telling you if I actually ran, or if I drove. Sugar and cinnamon taste so good, I’ll have to cut down, starting tomorrow. Or the next day.

9. Look in your heart

Sir Philip Sidney, a poet, wrote, “Look in your heart and write.” Or it was “thy” heart. Nobody uses “thy” anymore. Maybe we should, as in “Thy hair is beautiful.” Anyway, I look in my heart. It’s been broken a dozen times. It’s a skein of tangled threads, and it looks like a Mack truck hit the auricles and ventricles. That’s enough about my heart.

10. Delay No Longer

At least comes the point where I must delay no longer. I prepare myself to write an epic, iconic, enduring, anthology masterpiece. I sharpen five pencils and sit down with one of them and a piece of paper and write as follows:

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Summer has fled,

Cookies will do.

Thank you, my Muse!