I’d be making better progress if she’d stop
moving.
I get to where I think is a pretty good place
and she shifts her weight, or closes her paw, thinking
it’s a mouse in there. It’s not. It’s my statue,
a monument to something else. Something that isn’t here
any more, or that I haven’t been able to see
for a long time. I suspect it’s hovering around, like
a mosquito, and the only way I’ll be able to tell it’s close
is by the buzz. I’m not even sure what its name is now,
but I know its feeling: warm and soft and safe, like
a cat’s belly when she likes you, like the basket lined
with newspaper where her kittens collect themselves
nightly, like little campfires burning on a high plain.
I get to where I think is a pretty good place
and she shifts her weight, or closes her paw, thinking
it’s a mouse in there. It’s not. It’s my statue,
a monument to something else. Something that isn’t here
any more, or that I haven’t been able to see
for a long time. I suspect it’s hovering around, like
a mosquito, and the only way I’ll be able to tell it’s close
is by the buzz. I’m not even sure what its name is now,
but I know its feeling: warm and soft and safe, like
a cat’s belly when she likes you, like the basket lined
with newspaper where her kittens collect themselves
nightly, like little campfires burning on a high plain.