The artist and the muse...

Muses are poison
when they become human.
And they will.
If you so much as touch them
they will.
If you so much as speak to them
they will.
They will always become Icarus
and you will be beneath them.

There are the girls
with sharp noses
and drugged-up,
smoky eyes.
They are fae
with literary tattoos
on their backs
and they wear lacy socks
with gauzy dresses.
They are talented.
Multi-talented and beautiful.
Ugly beautiful and strange
and they have older boyfriends
with long hair.
The boyfriends take
naked pictures of the fae.
Perfect jaw line.
Perfect bones.

And there are the boys.
The boys with wild wings,
hard hands,
lips quick to kiss
the parts of you
they want to tattoo.
Perfect boys in your mind.
Perfect, perfect,
walking right past you everyday,
smiling and giving you poetry.

Then you let your human self
saunter up to these girls,
these boys,
these vile muses,
snakes,
apples,
and you shrink down
beneath them.
You shrink because you think
they are gods, goddesses,
you are unworthy of such inspiration.
Give, give,
you will give them everything.

But how quickly
they turn to dust.
Muses to humans.
And you'll see.
I promise you'll see.
You'll see the Adam
and the Eve
and the human they're made of.
But it will be too late.