National Poetry Writing Month #3

Feline Logic

Lapping threads of raindrops from eaves
weathered beyond repair, their creaking crevices
evidence of owners long-since buried,
he too exists without an owning,
his past and future looped
in the now,

in the flick of his quick, pink tongue
against the cold, unsure pinging of this day’s
gift from the sky, his ears pinned
in different directions, this skill,
like so many he has mastered,
his only defense of his perilous place
on this food chain.

Today is all he has ever had,
is all he will ever know
of an un-shrunk belly and the warm earth,
pawed and circled to fullness,
that is his definition of happy.

He leaps from the worn fence, his thirst
already forgotten. One front paw stretches
and then another, his backside rising
in a curve that could only be a gift
from His maker. He crouches
into the stealth that has brought him this far,
sniffs the air with practiced nostrils,
and steps into the new,

his knowing the envy
of every someone who has lain awake
counting unhatched chickens
or re-living torrents of emotion
like streams that flow forever.

Ramona Levacy
April 3, 2013