Sometimes I offer three phrases as a prompt, ask everyone to choose one, and then to write whatever comes to mind. We write for 20 minutes. In this case, the three phrase were:
What has endured?
Your impossible voice
I’m not that clever
The last one was inspired by Robyn, a pop singer I love. It’s a lyric from her song Get Myself Together. Here’s what I wrote in response to that line:
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Robyn, the tiny Swedish blonde pop singer, the Platinum Pixie, is dancing around on the stage under a silver blue light. It’s late May, unseasonably cold, my legs ache, but I’ve rarely been happier.
What a gift it is to find another soul in this fucked up world, to put makeup on and travel with him to Gay Day at Great America. Earlier, we had a chilly picnic at a nearby park, and later, a corn dog dipped in yellow mustard and a shared drink. The whole world is perfect.
Sometimes I wonder if we are magical twin fairies in a parallel universe, and then he pulls out a jar of glitter and showers me in silver and I think, maybe just we’re just fairies in this universe.
I think my dead mother has brought us together. I imagine her in the bathroom with us as he applies my silver eyelashes. She’s wearing the sparkly, violet lip balm he bought me, and he’s given her smokey eyes. “We’re starting to look more and more alike!” she giggles. I felt her there when we went to see Kylie Minogue–Queen of the Pixies. She took our hands and said, “Dance!” when the lights went down.
He’s some sort of shimmering lifeline in a world of bad news and broken hearts. He’s a quick-witted boy who loves beauty, but goes down deep into philosophical late night conversations. “You two remind me of one another,” a girlfriend says. We look nothing alike, though. He’s tall and thin; I’m cherubic. But we often speak in stereo, have the same song stuck in our heads. Got rainbow colors and no more rain. “Oh my God!” he says. “We just harmonized perfectly! Let’s do that again!”
Last night, we had a Moulin Rouge party. I had never seen it, and it’s one of his favorites. Our gal pal arrived, DVD in hand, wearing a violet bustier. I was in a t-shirt and tennis shoes. I was greasy and worn out from a long day. I felt anything but beautiful. “Sit down, Pixie,” he said. “and close your eyes.” I could hear the makeup drawers opening and shutting. I felt the brush skip across my face. When he was done, I opened my eyes and looked in the mirror. I looked like Peter Pan in glamorous drag.
I swear, this guy can perform magic.
The Catalyst 