Sonnet #136

The cat insists on writing a poem this time

I ask her what she'd like to say, and she pushes

At my hands to drive them off from all rhymes

All keystrokes, just affection, purring thrushes

in her throat, the gentle knead of air, a flicking tail

She lives in a moment of imminent need

There's no remorse among the cats for when they fail

The only memory is instinct and muscle and breed

and what tiny training we managed to instill

Between the chases for lizards in the garden 

And the way she finds the things that smell 

like herself for her to lie and dream down in

If a cat's life can be a poem, if she could speak

Live for now, right now, is the only song she keeps