Cold water flows down my face and I open my eyes. Damn him! Again… My nose inhales fusty air and I understand that this nightmare isn’t just a delirium. It’s real… I take up the wet pen. I write ‘fuck you’ carefully in the moist writing-book. Letters are dancing and I close my eyes, but I can’t close my ears.

– She will write. She can. She’s trying to rebel but I can force her.

…give me the strength to speak and to be silent
give me the strength to be a lamb and a tyrant…

Some might suppose that this is my paradise. I would agree if it were not for one zesty detail… What would you name the paradise that you can’t leave? I call it ‘a gaol’. Do you want to debate this? No? I thought not…

…give me the strength to inflict the death-blow
give me the strength to endure the last throe…

Sometimes I try to hide myself. I squeeze my puny body into the corner behind the door and close my eyes. This trick doesn’t work. She finds me, finds me every time. I still don’t know how she does this. I’m always on the alert yet I’m always taken unawares. She moves like a weasel. She has small sharp teeth and eyes like gimlets…

…give me the strength to hold the king’s crown
give me the force to stay the court clown…

– What are you mumbling? Stop it! You can’t fool me! I know you from the ground up! Write! Stop talking! Write! Write!

…give me the strength to lift up the baton
give me the strength to stop the marathon…

She bends over me. Muses are the most cruel and pitiless creatures.
I curse the first fucking day when I wrote my first poem. I curse the first fucking day when I saw her small sharp teeth and her eyes like gimlets.
I curse the first fucking day when I smiled at her. She…

My Afflation. My Curse. My Muse… I lose my consciousness. Finally… (to be continued)

by TETIANA ALEKSINA
© All rights reserved 2014