photography as devotion

romancing the erotic muse { sbfr 4 }

you were so concerned this morning with that god forsaken bloated feeling that sometimes comes with being a woman. his name on your phone screen. a message that draws you into your spine. into your pussy. into your ache.

you feel beneath the weight in your belly and it dissolves.

you’re still in his system? he’s been in yours for two weeks. he knows that though.

respond to the moment. don’t force things. notice, you remind yourself every day, feeling inspiration arise. asking — does the impulse to move come with it? it doesn’t always. inspiration gets you high but sometimes the trip is not worth your energy.

lately you’ve been focusing on one thing. clarity. it’s a new experience. not clarity that knows certainty. clarity that knows her lens. chooses. remembers. perception is a choice. a choice. a choice.

here it is.

to want is a verb. the idea of a thing isn’t enough to evoke honest action. you have to feel it. in your hips. in your womb. feel him. you told him that. you feel him in your womb. horrifying.

lessons in trust and openness.

you’re editing your next thing and you want to respond to the message but you wait. focus. focus. focus. stay in it now because you chose this and excitement actually does not have to derail you. you love the obsession. you love it. all that energy into the spacious vortex you’ve been lowering yourself into for decades. too slow to notice you were in it till he pointed you out. you’re real. not a fantasy. words from tomorrow but they’re already coming.

writing finished you finger through your closet. maybe this pink slip you used to avoid thinking it was too tight. it fits now. perfectly. just enough room in the hips. you’re smaller physically but energetically everything is moving. you drop weight when you breathe correctly. do they know that? if you say it publicly they’ll think you you’re anorexic. idiots.

slipped into slip you’re drawn to the bathroom floor. you’ve spent a lot of time here, in this particular corner, with a camera turned toward you. often naked.

the rug used to be white. now it’s marigold. it doesn’t match your skin tone so you roll it up and push it out of frame.

playlist on - let me show you.

you already are, he said two weeks ago.

you’re not finished.

tripod you’ll abandon in a few minutes. hand gets more interesting angles. self portraits are magic. being in two places at once. maybe three? you are seeing yourself tomorrow.

eyes wander. hands. silk awakening body. intrigue arries. pulls you. you lean into her angles. colors. shapes. textures. the lighting is imperfect. as is everything. you’ve always worked with random lamps and a little panel light. the other stuff is unnecessary. you’re not doing this for a fashion magazine.

you’re working with what life presents. cultivating greatness out of limitation.

the constraint is the catalyst.

send him the video. fingers trailing silk, pausing. breath. holding.
you’re in my system. but you already know that.

i’m just your muse, aren’t i?
he asks a good question.

yes, and…

i am my own muse first. an energetic vortex. when someone inspires me, i don’t place my power in them. i get to appreciate exactly who they be and what they evoke in me.

for the muse to emerge there must be space. boundaries. the erotic synapse must live. there must be mystery, intrigue, desire to know, to reveal. to see.

eros at play.

play is key. you look through the photos. see the look in your eyes change… see yourself smile and be silly and deeply interested in what is happening. you notice the little heart dangling from your necklace and like a child, want to put it in your mouth. consume it. so you do. touch gold to tongue, to lips. you like the tiny gold rounds of the chain against your lips.

pleasure takes infinite forms. discovering them is a matter of where you are looking and if you are feeling. creativity without pleasure doesn’t exist. sometimes it’s called destruction. there is pleasure in self destruction too. it’s not bad. it’s not wrong. it’s something you have to move through. the performance of it all. let it hurt so much you get fed up with yourself and finally finally choose to reveal the next most honest part of you.