Req for recs

[kaberett]

Apparently this week I am pondering the construction of the idea of "muse" instead of working on my transfer report.

In particular I am wondering about how other people have conceptualised their relationships with real flesh-and-blood human beings they consider muses; presence/absence, the form of inspiration, and so on, and so forth. I think there is an essay trying to happen, but in order to tease out the details I rather suspect I need to expose myself to a wider range of viewpoints.

Suggestions and discussion in comments very much appreciated.

eta "museum" is "a seat or shrine of the Muses"!!!!

Comments

[kaberett]

Ani DiFranco: every song has a "you"/a "you" that the singer sings to/and you're it this time/baby, you're it this time

You have told me about S in this respect, yeah; Sonnet came out of me saying, in bed, flippantly, "I'd call you must if it'd make you smile", and the person in question saying "heh, sounds like poetry"; whereupon I went "... I'd have to tweak the meter but good point", and whatever we'd been going to get around to doing was suddenly off the table ;)

(Actually, P!nk does a lot of singing to the absent-you also. Hmm. Hmm. Yes, good, thank you for prompting me to realise that the absent-other is a frequent focal point.)

[alexseanchai]

\o/

also, lovely poem

[quirkytizzy]

I like this. May Sarton, a writer and a poet I love, once said that EVERY poem is a love poem - it's just often the "you" is intangible, or else not directly expressed. But it IS there. Even if it's not a person, it IS something. She also uses the word "love" to mean that incomprehensible, often maddening push-and-pull, the back and forth, the power OF emotion, even if it's not love, but something we are in love WITH. (Such as sorrow, or anger, or the way the tea steams from our cup at breakfast.)

I don't know if I have people muses or character muses. I can't write fiction. I don't have worlds of fantasy or new places in my head. I always write memoir stuff. I guess the closest thing to a person muse I have is other people who write stuff about THEIR lives that makes me want to write about MINE.