The Artist, The Alchemist, & The Addict

A mythological mapping of the creative psyche and its relationship with a Muse. It is never simple, because the creator is never a single self. Every creator houses a trinity: the Artist who builds legacies, the Alchemist who brews meaning from suffering, and the Addict who is seduced by its own chaos. This series charts the collision between the sacred trinity of the creative spirit and the external inspiration that ignites their eternal war. 

I. The Proposition

A beautiful poison.
A powerful weapon.
Disastrous remedy.

Fluttered with the jitters,
appears I’ve come under,
another dose, my dear?

With your great gift of love
I will fuel creation
turning soul into paint.

I’m sick, but I know truth:
Your salvation; my death.
My salvation; your death.

I’ll paint you what I can
while I still am- able…
but save your medicine.

I won’t allow us- our
mutual destruction,
I chose a path from love.

Even still… Won’t you just…
Give me that one last taste
before sending me out?

Sing to me sweet nothings
until I pass this plane…
So that I’m not alone.

II. The Razor’s Edge

The more I,
The more I,
The more I…

Walk the razor’s edge
while trying not to fall off-
Or get cut too much.

III. The Undefined Variable

I don’t know how to fix you.
I’ve run out of hypotheses.

I mixed every rogue powder,
tonic, and elixir—
Every herb we could fit in a pipe.

I prescribed a beach holiday,
sent you to the mountains,
to peyote mystics of Rainbow Sands,
to tree bark shamans.

You saw the Dalai Lama…

Nothing I did seemed to help.

I have all the data,
and a proven formula,
but the equation never works out.

There’s an immutable error:
You just can’t divide by zero.

I’m sorry,
but you’re an undefined variable
after all…

I’ve done all I can.
You’re on your own.

IV. The Obsidian Blade

Knapped your heart
Into an obsidian blade-
To carve our souls 
into the void.

Against all reason,
I touched your honed edge
just to see 
you bleed me out.

I built my own prison to protect you
because
your approval became my drug-
not my salvation.

V. The First Date

We scared her away.

She came for the Artist,
to revel in creation,
to see a world born.

But the Addict demanded 
that the Alchemist
merge our souls 
on the first date.

And it was just…
Too ridiculous.
Much too much-
Of course.

Maybe we’ll learn.
Maybe not.
How many times has this happened?
North of 20, I suppose.

The last time we merged,
it was cataclysmic-
Life-destroying.

Why does he keep insisting?

VI. The Thesis

Addict ruins all
Artist builds a legacy
Alchemist reforms

A spirit ingrained in mud
Painting my eternal life

VII. The Artist’s Vow

What is this thing stirring inside?
I should like to give it a hue.

You gifted me your sacred pulse,
I shall give it physical form.

In parallel to your divine,
I present this composition.

I wish for nothing more than just
to immortalize your beauty.

I am lost within your detail.
My hands fail its reproduction,
but my heart leaps bounds,
for I’ve mapped you out,
wholly, my own way.
And it’s- 
P e r f e c t !
F l a w e d !
I n c o m p l e t e !
M e s s y !
And it says so much
of how I love you.

One day I will die and be gone,
but I swear to our God above:
The world will witness your beauty-
For at least ten thousand more years.
As this is my only purpose.

VIII. The Alchemist’s Confession

I had stitched you back alive,
after every single death,
writing down all of your shit.

I try to find a meaning
in stars, charts, signs, and metals,
while brewing poppy petals.

Not meant to send you into stupor,
but to still the untamed heart a while,
because you’re freaking me the fuck out,
and messing up my inner sanctum.

But I’ve created a monster,
and now the Artist is dying-
So I rebalance the formula.

Knowing you will drink it down,
wretched for some medicine,
even though I know you know,
It will be our undoing.

Pouring over what remains
of Flamel’s old library…
I stumbled onto a clue
to lead us all closer to
our sacred eternal truth.

Go to sleep now, my children,
while I calculate it all,
in the arcane astral plane.

IX. The Addict’s Plea

I guck and write and piss and moan.
Your shattered dreams I call my own.

Give me, give me more and more.
I’ve drunk and drunk, and I have whored.

I may be callous; I may be kind.
My truth is buried within this lie.

I need you now more than ever,
I need you more now forever.

Saturn overrode by Scorpio Moon,
Behold extreme emotion-al typhoon. 

I surrender myself to you
to do with as you please.
I’m grasping at straws, trying to breathe.
I just need more- Please. 
I’m begging on my knees…
Just a little more of your love.
I lie when I promise that’s it, this time.
I’ll take from you everything.
And still need more…

FUCK!

X. The Mutiny

Weren’t for us,
he wouldn’t even care.
He would just
sit there and stare.

Weren’t for you,
I would have done it,
and gotten us
safely to paradise.

Weren’t for me,
you would never have
mastered my pain,
through this brush.
–

I don’t need you,
any of you now,
I only want her.

She is my all.
I needn’t exist but just
to share her space,
and be content
in her loving elixir.

She is the crux ansata.
I observe truth,
and it can balance us,
but to get there
I need to study,
because I need to know-
Her everything.

For she is Venus-
The fabled one,
everything to me.
Beauty and cunning,
and divine inspiration.
I should like to just…
Observe truth,
and be content,
and let my heart speak
through this brush.
–

Weren’t for us,
he would forget to breathe.

Weren’t for you,
I wouldn’t have a purpose.

Weren’t for me,
to put soul through this brush.

XI. The Treaty of Fools 

Gazing in her depth,
we realize our struggle
does her no justice

We must now band together
if ever we wish to know

She deserves the world
But at least we can give her
Everything we have

Still, it might not be enough-
In unity, there’s a chance

We should give a try
This ship is sunk anyway
At least die in love

For if we can’t save ourselves
Maybe she holds the answer

XII. The Sacrifice

There are too many hands in the pot!

I can’t focus-
I’m trying to study my subject,
but I just keep…

Breathing her in- paralyzed.

I can’t control this feeling.
I cannot shape or form.
My colors are muddled.
My values are misaligned.

So, I asked the Alchemist
for the one final truth…

What did you read in Nicholas’ tome?

He paused,

Forbidden.

Not that.  It won’t work.

Not this time. Not ever!

Do not be a desperate fool.

…

In a strange moment of clarity,
the Addict spoke up,

I cannot go on like this…

Please!

I am that desperate fool.

And the Artist is
our only chance.

So, take me to the Gate…

I’ll see you on the other side.

…

Knowing the truth
of that equation,
he wished he did not know…

With a heavy heart,
the Alchemist made careful preparation
of the hemlock and the yew.

Desperate for any medicine,
the Fool drank it down.
Knowing that he knew
he would come undone-
For good; For love.

And then there were two.
–

The Alchemist gave the Artist
all of his texts and all of his charts,
and showed him how to read the runes,
and pointed him to his lucky stars…

And he drank the tonic too.

…

XIII. Divine Dissatisfaction 

The Artist worked himself to the bone.

He tried to remember to eat,
and to drink,
and to sleep,
but like the Addict before him,

He was of a single-track mind.

He worked and worked until he collapsed.
Day after day, week after week,
Month after month, year after year.

He stayed fully devoted
to the Muse
because she was-
e v e r y t h i n g .

And she was all he had left…

In one thousand paintings,
he spilled his blood-
Becoming starved and sickly.

He put too much of his soul into the trade,
and he never felt he was worthy-
That he was just letting her down.

He needed her love but never got it…
She only loved herself in his work.

The art was everything; He was nothing.
Just a conduit and all alone.

So, with the final stroke,
on the final painting,
he knew his work was done-
That her legacy was secured.

So he wandered out into the cold, snowy street
to be with his brothers once more.

XIV. [Reprise] The Proposition, Known

A beautiful poison.
A powerful weapon.
Disastrous remedy.

Fluttered with the jitters,
appears I’ve come under,
another dose, my dear?

With your great gift of love
I will fuel creation
turning soul into paint.

I’m sick, but I know truth:
Your salvation; my death.

fin.