To Be a Cat
by Laura Greenall

It’s not easy to be a cat
It’s not true that I always sleep
Sometimes I move from the bed to the chair
And I have to eat and use the box
My face must be washed and my toes kept clean
Then I move from the chair to the clean laundry basket
Ah, bliss. I love the smell of fabric softener in the morning
Don’t forget the purring that I do for my humans
But sweet reward is the petting and stroking
Time to eat once again, “please a can,” I meow
I can’t abide dry food, after all I am finicky
Now I clean my face with licked paws
Oh, exhaustion, think I’ll take a nap

***

FOOTSTEPS

The footsteps that remained inside the floor”s
Rug-covered wood recalled what last month”s
Footsteps left from when the footsteps
Departed from the curls and scars of city rivers.
The footsteps left a drop of quivering water
On a pigeon”˜s, colored like a white orchid, fallen feather,
Drops of paralyzed tears and their crutches
On a flock of gray gravel that had closed their eyes
And wobbled towards broken glass covering grasses.
The footsteps splashed as if the wood were water,
Splashed against the cobwebs on the ceiling and fell
On the bottoms of white chairs and evaporated
To leave long rows of white circles.
***

WIND

A wind of curls that wore a black pants suit
Raced by to flap the flag and chase
The spinning pigeons off the rooftops.
In the bedrooms, the beds put eyeglasses
On their sheets who gazed through the wallpaper
Over the heads of paper roosters
And the stems and curves of red apples
To take notes on the shape of the wind”s legs.
The photographs atop the piano took out
Sketch books and created one-stroke Japanese paintings.
Each stroke duplicated the wrinkles in the wind”s knees.
The wind blew by and the mirrors changed their images
From the wind”s legs to moonlit trap doors.
***

THE EYES OF THE MOON

All planes were grounded
Because the moon opened one eye.
Walls were built around all cities
So the darkness could be x-rayed
And frisked before being allowed to enter.
It was learned that darkness had only one rib
That was made from the thoughts of the zithers
Plucked by Thamar and Ammnon.
Some said that darkness carried a pot of geraniums
With a pink cricket hiding under the leaves
That sung a song about the shadows
Of ghost crabs crossing long salt flats.
Others disputed the discovery, said it was
Semirande wearing a black pants suit
And carrying a pink parasol to the South Pole.
One frightened man said darkness
Carried two baskets filled
With the ashes of burned carnations.
The people were in panic, fearing
That the moon might open both eyes.

ARRIVAL AT THE CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD

When I first arrived in Tampa,
The city of skulls and bolita balls.
I found everyone was buried,
Only their heads stuck out of cement graves,
So they stuck out their tongues
To rub across lipstick smeared on a beer bottle
Shaped to resemble Helen of Troy’s adolescent lips.
It was a city of warped billiard balls
And homebrew in the back room behind swinging doors
With over-peppered chili sold up front.
It was the city of the short half-pint
And hair tonic with fifty percent alcohol.
The voting booths were surrounded
By barbed wire and sawed-off shotguns.