I went to a Community Christmas Concert last afternoon. At one point, all sixty voices swelled and dropped, clinging to a minor chord. It was beyond beautiful.

As I listened, I felt the pulse of a poets blood
beating in my wrists. I was filled with a vast
sense - the wild sense that I was about to create;
something, I thought, beautiful, and dark, and
holy at once. The sense that the most sacred
recesses of my mind were about to be opened
in a flood. I sat with pen in hand, and realized
that inspiration was my masterpiece.

Sometimes I wonder if artistic people expect too much of themselves. We think we ought to be dashing off brilliant productions every time we feel a poem is tragic, or a choir holy. Sometimes I wonder if the mere fact that we are inspired by another man's work is more of a timeless epic than any Iliad or Opera will be; if it is really the completion of the composers inspiration.