Words have always been my friends. Under the anonymous, invisible cloak of night, when the monsters crawl from the corners, from under the bed, from the scary depths of my being, I have found my safety in words. Words have been my steadfast companions. Sometimes truncated and parsed. Sometimes poetic. But always steadfast. Always at my side – always at hand. Not always rolling from my tongue, but scrolling from my pen to the page, always.

Words: My reliable, sometimes relentless, companions.

And yet. For the last year or so, they seem to have deserted me. Seem to have slunk away to skulk in some corner, sulking. Like a self-imposed time-out. I guess a part of me has felt abandoned, whereas another part has let it be. “If you love something, set it free”. But I’ve realized that I miss my erstwhile companions. After a lifetime of seemingly inextricable entanglement, I feel quite lost without. I’m hoping that they’ve chosen to go walkabout, but only on a long leash, or are boats, bobbing merely beyond the harbour, ready on the right tide, to come floating back to my bay. But if they’re birds, flown up into the blue, I’m hoping, I really am, that they’ll be back to nestle in the tangled trees of my brain, and that they’ll once more sing their songs to me.

Please. Please come back my sirens (I am waiting here in this dark night with the black dog at my side).