17 September 2005

startled into life like fire

in grievous deity my cat
walks around
he walks around and around
with
electric tail and
push-button
eyes

he is
alive and
plush and
final as a plum tree

neither of us understands
cathedrals or
the man outside
watering his
lawn

if I were all the man
that he is
cat -
if there were man
like this
the world could
begin

he leaps up on the couch
and walks through
porticoes of my
admiration


Charles Bukowski, 1920-1994

2 comments

Anonymous said...

for maggie
Most, death left a hole
a place where she'd been
An emptiness stays
no matter what or who
No law of account not
There but for the
grace of God go I
Pain simply of want
last empty goodbye
Put hand on her head
good dog,good dog
feel her gone
Robert Creeley

Pris said...

Bukowski on a cat. I hadn't seen that poem. Thanks for posting it.