Death is No Thing Where You’re Not.

I sit on the deck, and the silence taken off from a breeze brushes my cheek.
I must be cubbied just so beneath the eaves of the house.
It is not nothing, cannot be nothing, there is something in that stillness.
Something warm and static, the negative space
That defines the small and large things that I am.

Cradling and holding up my face, the air all around me.

I get up and walk to the house, having to pull hard on the sliding glass door.
It must need oil, but I still don’t do those kinds of things.
And I let up when the space is just large enough to pass through,
The relief in my neck and shoulders is immense,
Inaudible—that lack of tension is something too.

The moment after I crack my back is one of our greatest times.

I pour a cup of coffee, but like it lukewarm, so it’s way too hot for drinking.
In the minutes I wait, steam pouring from the mug,
You are there--in the time I am forced to accept my own silence, and my moments
Ticking by, and how freshness rubs me the wrong way.
I curl my paws around the steam, hot and vital.

But I prefer the outsides of my hands, the bony crust left to motionless room air.

(This poem is "to be continued."  Also, it is of note that it is inspired by Marie.)