"Writing is the
only religion I know and follow.
My temple is in the pillars of type,
My altar through the doors of syllables."
Black
Her eyes always blind me with their radiance and her form lures me with its fluidity. She is the colour of luminescent coal, her hair is a shimmering black helmet of curls, and her eyes are grey prisms that catch the sun. I saw her first in a forest glade when I was a child looking for stories. She threw her head back and laughed when she saw me. I laughed with her then and now I grow old with her.
She sat me down that day and drew from her dress a pouch of cotton. She spilled baubles and gemstones and beads and pearls on the apple-green heather and strung them to make stories. She talked to me of love and beauty and magic and joy. Of time's wings and its fluttering against the world to make it turn. She told me stories in which the universe was a swirl of rainbows, of colours we would never see and none could describe. She told me how stars twinkled because they burn out and immediately light again. She took my hand and led me through the trees and taught me a way to turn sight into sound, thought into meaning and feelings into words. She showed me how the sky lived in the lake and how small invisible stones could make up the air.
I learnt her stories and spun new ones on my own, stringing words together to adorn the bare necks of paper. She smiled at me and gently corrected the wayward words that ran over like mercury drops. She channeled my thoughts into streams of beauty. When I began to see her image in my words, I knew I was an artist. I saw her fluidity echoed in my cohesion, her curls in my metaphors, her grey diamond eyes in my lines and her diaphanous colour of coal in the columns of type.
She lives with me now as she lived then. I spy her lightly sitting on my desk as I struggle with my poetry. She looks at me with the fondness of a mother, the yearning of a lover and the foresight of a father. She is Imagination, the only God I know or worship.
White
His eyes always graze me with their asperity and his form repels me with its stiffness. He is the colour of the coldest snow, his hair is a long sheet of tortured gold, and his eyes are lifeless blue icicles that mock the moon. I saw him first in a dark avenue when I was a youth looking for ideas. He looked down and cursed when he saw me. I shuddered at his sight then and now I shudder at the remembrance.
He pulled me up to his height and concealed my talent in his velvet pouch. He stole baubles and gemstones and beads and pearls that had built up inside me as ideas to fashion poetry. He spoke to me of the death of love and beauty and magic and joy. Of love's cliche and the ghosts that haunt the writer's brain. He told me stories in which love was a bromide, an oft-repeated phrase with no treasure for a reader to find. He told me how stars could only twinkle and not sing or have emotions. He caught me by my cuff and led me through the streets and taught me how to turn sight and thought and feeling into platitudes that everyone had heard before. He taught me bromides and trite remarks and killed my writer's soul.
I succumbed to his ways and spun yarns with words of others strung together as my necklace for paper. He spurred me on and sucked away freshness as if it was a stagnant water drop. He constricted my soul into a tunnel of ugliness. When I began to see his image in my words, I knew I was a literary hack. I saw his rigidity in my structure, his long hair in my sluggish lines, his empty blue eyes in my meaning and his colour of snow in the blankness of my mind.
He taunts me now as he taunted me then. I feel him weighing down my pen as I struggle with my poetry.
He looks at me with the malice of a master, the lust of a libertine and the spite of a sorcerer. He is Unoriginality, the only Devil I know or fear.
