"Are you ready?" He asks in an inquisitive tone.
"Are we ever?" I playfully banter back with a smirk that doesn't seem to resonate with him well.
His face remains stoic. Serious.
He repeats, "Are you ready?"
I look into his eyes from across the mahogany table. Feeling his unplayful tone register in me. Feeling the prolific power behind his motive. His investigation.
"Are we ever ready?" I repeat more thoughtfully. "For anything?"
"You have to be for this. Are you ready to coddle it? To nurture it? To give it what it needs to grow?"
His face remains straight. His voice remains monotone.
"I don't know." I vulnerably answer. "But I am committed. Is that enough?" I ask hearing the tremble in my own voice as the words seep out.
"Is it ever?" He fires my words back to me. Feeling them burn in my chest as they marinate.
Now he smirks, while my face grows stoic. "Will you listen?" He asks.
"Yes." I answer.
"Will you allow it to breathe?"
"Yes."
"Will you not force your thoughts, fears, judgements or opinions onto it?"
I feel a lump rise. A panic surge. Thinking , Is that possible? Is that controllable?
"I want to." I hear my voice uncertainly speak.
I feel his eyes pierce through me. Looking into my soul. Gaging. Feeling his own judgement rise at what he sees before him. Inside me.
He leans forward. His elbows on the shiny wood before him. He intertwines his fingers with a patience as if explaining to me for the first time. "This thing. This being. Is it's own. It is a gift. But it is not yours to silence. It thinks for itself. It wakes when you sleep. It hungers at inappropriate times. It cries when you are busy... Are you ready?" He repeats.
I gulp. Feeling the lump rise to the back of my throat. Wondering if I am. Questioning I may never be. But an inner knowing within me, this is the journey I must take. This blind leap of faith. Into my creativity. Into my soul. The story wants to be told. The story I have carried with me. That I always wanted to speak.
He is right. It has become its own being. A fierce beast. A determined entity. A necessity. A need to survive. Demanding to be told. I have kept it quiet for too long. I can't, I won't, any longer.
"It does not matter if I am ready. Because it is. I am listening. I am willing. I am present. I am here." I say.
I watch as the serious man nods and vanishes before me. The end of the mahogany desk now empty before me. Now only me and the creativity sitting at the table.
I pick up the pen once again. To listen. To record everything it says. I listen intently to hear every whisper being spoken within me. Every crack of silence, of the words breaking free. Finally, ready. Destined to be told. Words meant to be out into the world. Words meant for me to write them.
