(Inspired by “Beside the Waterfall” by Mary Oliver, 1993)
At daybreak
the large cat-
Jake by name-
Reached down
Under the bed—dust and bottle caps mostly—
Under the white
eiderdown,
And dragged out,
In plain view,
a mouse;
it was extremely tiny,
like a small toy
and, blessedly,
it was dead.
Jake
examined the
tiny soft brown body and then
expertly
tackled
the beautiful delicate body,
tossing it and
tossing it back and
crunching it.
And during this time
the light was growing brighter
When I spoke his name
Jake simply glanced at me.
White flecked around the muzzle
and with soft glance
he, too, if you can see it
had a face like the mouse; and then it was daylight
which had been dawning all the while anyway
sun broke
clear of the pines and dropped its bloody pink light
over everything
Published in La Presa Issue 10, Fall 2020
