~

I once had Thanksgiving in New Mexico

With a family I also once had.

That was many, many moons ago;

And many moons have long since passed.

 

And I find myself here, still middle-fenced.

As some things still stay, some move on hence,

And leads me to the story, which follows:

 

~

A conventional meal, with Turkey as focal,

Followed by football, tradition.

At the Half-time break, people all rise,

And traipse back into the kitchen.

 

And there! four-square, he straddles the turkey,

Morris my cat, celebrating.

 

Just where Morris came from, I haven’t the clue;

I may have forgotten; but now, I don’t know.

 

In retrospect, where ever we met,

Perhaps, I just never knew.

 

~

My three year-old daughter, a little bit lazy,

Leaves all her clothing a strew.

Especially true, should you see in her room,

Where she leaves her drawers open, askew.

 

And Morris, the cat, really likes all of that;

An open drawer, where he likes to go pooh.

 

Oh, I almost forgot – there’s one favorite spot

That Morris seems to like a lot better:

A corner of rug, of the living room where

Morris will leave it to linger.

 

I heard him once, trying to open

The screen-door we tend to leave open.

So I went to the door to let that cat in

And he saunters right past, like nothing.

 

I went to the kitchen, where there my suspicion

Arose – just what was that cat’s mal-intention?

 

So I go the the bedroom, to check in the drawers;

No problem, the drawers were not open.

 

I was on the way back into the kitchen,

That I heard that damnable cat,

As he scampered and rushed out the door,

Raising a whole lot attention.

 

“Oh Shit!”  I yelled, when I checked on the floor,

Morris has got me once more.

 

~

Many years had passed, 

And I’d moved to Virginia,

With my family, and also that cat.

And there I was, with the cat and also a vet,

Who diagnosed it as Feline Leukemia.

 

 

Morris was sick, but also grown old,

As I held him alive for the last time,

For Feline Leukemia does take its toll.

 

Limp and heavy, then goes the body,

When the nine lives leave all but the cat.

 

And Morris there died,

Yet something inside

Cried, for old Morris the cat.

He was gone now,

And that was just that.

 

And I buried him there, In Central Virginia,

A long, long way from his home.

 

~

And I’ve sit here since,

All middle fenced,

And pondered the few things I know:

 

Nothing in life is full-recompensed;

And change can come fast, or go slow.

 

 

 

 

revised 17 May 2013

©2013, Marvin Loyd Welborn

http://www.tinkwelborn.me