2020.7 Love Projects

You are curled in something like sleep; you keep turning over, stretching, yawning, causing all of us, in our own ways, to feel a certain melting in the chest, caress the sight of you, bless the imperative that led us to – essentially – rescue you. You, feet up, eyes tightly shut, butter wouldn’t melt over any aspect of your svelte self, are – presumably – oblivious to what you’ve done. Your hair’s growing back so well from the escapade that led you to plead for shelter, a welter of wounds and malnutrition and skittery nature fostered by a cold season in an untrustworthy world, subsumed and excised by your time with us, a long and lovely month. We each have our own theories when you seem out of sorts – she says you’re bored, courts your claws and gentle bites, inviting tumbling play. No, I say – you’re clearly tired and overcrowded, vow to soothe you, prove my worth with soft kneading, yielding lullabies. By contrast, his theory is either food he’s powerless to resist giving or simply that you, yourself, are confused about your own state. And you blithely grace us with each pat, each purr, each turned circle to better comfort, the dumbstruck love you summon in us, renewing every day.

You arrived with Spring

Ignorance wasn’t blissful

We’ve been adopted.

Picture of the redoubted Milady Cariad in all her slumbering, soft-bellied glory.
Source: Carla Keen.