Rusty things: the wail of a cat in heat, a squirrel’s slow scold, the cry of a jay, and the black cherry leaves fading to a coppery red.
cats
Monday September 19, 2011
A meadow vole takes an after-death journey into the forest in the jaws of a cat, who holds her head high for once and does not slink.
Saturday August 20, 2011
A catbird scolds a feral cat: harsh, descending Nos. Slick with dew, the lanceolate leaves of goldenrod shimmer in the sun like green fish.
Saturday June 11, 2011
Dead bracken leaf: a sun-bleached carcass. A feral cat pads down the road undetected by squirrels, its sodden gray coat the color of gravel.
Saturday April 23, 2011
Four gray squirrels interrupt their chasing to scold the feral cat—a Two Minutes’ Hate. In the corner of my eye, the zip of a winter wren.
Sunday March 13, 2011
On the flattened grass where snow has sat for months, the gray disk of an old hornet nest. The feral cat presses her belly fur to the earth.
Tuesday January 18, 2011
Fine snow blurs the edges of the porch. The feral cat has walked in her own footsteps through the garden, a clear print in each old crater.
Friday May 28, 2010
The first four peonies burst their buds in the night and open to a sky of hazy pink. From under the house, a cat’s hollow cough.
Tuesday February 02, 2010
My meditative sit is spoiled by the incessant scolding of a squirrel, set off by a feral tabby. Now I know why Nanzen killed the cat.
Saturday November 21, 2009
A half-grown barn cat crawls out from under the house, gray and bedraggled as a clump of drier lint. One jay rasping at the top of a locust.