The cat, gray with strong black stripes,
came with the house. He was here first.
We don't know his ways.
He lets us hold him carefully,
his bulk of fur.
He puts his paws on our faces,
rubs his cold nose in our necks.
He catches skin between
teeth.
Small love nips.
We love his lazy walk,
his purr.
But then he brought mice,
their skulls sucked clean as seed pods;
defeathered birds.
And the cat strutted, waiting
for praise.
He is so sure we don't love him
that he bribes us with these gifts.
We bought him a collar
with a row of bells.
One day he brought a squirrel,
arranging it in a curve around
a pot of geraniums.
The cat puffed himself up proud.
We wondered how he'd caught it
with that noisy collar.
When we pulled the squirrel
from behind the pot, we found
that it was flat.
It had been run over.
The cat found it in the road and dragged
it home.
A bargain basement gift.
I hold him then, bury my face
in his cedar-scented fur
and tell him he
doesn't need to.
I will love him anyway.
BEHIND THE MEOW:
We moved into a house years ago and the people who lived there had to leave their cat. They were moving into a place that did not allow pets. They were both elementary school teachers and they named the cat Mr. C. Evidently Mr. C was feeling insecure because he brought us gifts everyday. We held small funerals and burials constantly. We had Mr. C for many years.
ABOUT:
Ellie J. Anderson lives in the Pacific Northwest. She mostly writes fiction but she has recently published poems in the San Pedro River Review, Glimpse, Deep Wild, Third Wednesday, Rupture, Stick Figure, Evening Street, Comstock Review, the Bryant Literary Review, and others. She has three pieces accepted for fall publication in The Scapegoat Review, Backwards Trajectory and the Wrath-Bearing Tree. To see more of her work, please visit: https://www.elliejanderson.com Also, join her on Facebook at Ellie J. Anderson’s Literature.
EDITOR'S SONG PAIRING: Look At The Cats! — Squirrel
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