Panglossian
06-25-2011, 06:57 PM
After staring at a poster of missing cat, I ventured along a country track on the lookout for a white feline with a black spot on the middle of its back.
Clouds were gathering yet the sun’s eye stared.
Veering left into a wooded area I noticed the remains of campfire.
Bean tins and beer cans and sodden crisp packets.
Nearby lay a pink horse, a child’s toy.
I didn’t touch it.
Through the branches of the shabby trees, mute-coloured fields rose to a brown horizon.
The sky above the landscape’s lumpy line was almost purple.
I wonder where it is, I thought.
Is it trapped?
Has it lost its way?
Is it cowering in a quiet corner somewhere?
Has it been stolen?
Accidentally transported elsewhere?
Maybe it was hit by a car, and now it’s dead by the side of the road under a bush?
These things happen, I thought.
In the bog-standard trees I stood alone.
The breeze sharpened.
Those clouds I mentioned grouped together and conspired to blocked out the sun.
White with a black spot.
A domestic shorthair.
To my right the sound of laughter.
Some people sharing a joke behind a garden fence.
Male laughter with a silver-lining of female.
I wondered what could be so amusing.
Emerging from the trees I gazed across the faded-green fields.
Monday morning.
The people of a close-by house are missing a cat.
It’s not that serious.
Not really.
But it might be trapped somewhere.
In a garden shed or a vacated house.
If so I won’t see it.
I can’t go snooping in people’s gardens.
And why should I?
It’s not my cat.
My cat went missing three years ago.
Vanished without a trace.
I did everything I could to find it.
Put up posters, told the neighbours, listed it online.
Not one response.
No-one has seen hide nor hair of it since.
Three years ago.
14 years old it was.
The last time I saw it was at dusk.
As fate would have it I took a photo as it skipped along the top of the wall at the end of our garden.
What are the odds of that!
I actually have a photograph of my cat at the moment I saw it last.
Three years ago it is, since he vanished without a trace.
Not one response.
So now I search for other people’s missing cats.
At random, you understand, when I see a poster, like today.
White with a black spot.
A domestic shorthair.
It’s lost and I am looking.
I miss my cat.
Clouds were gathering yet the sun’s eye stared.
Veering left into a wooded area I noticed the remains of campfire.
Bean tins and beer cans and sodden crisp packets.
Nearby lay a pink horse, a child’s toy.
I didn’t touch it.
Through the branches of the shabby trees, mute-coloured fields rose to a brown horizon.
The sky above the landscape’s lumpy line was almost purple.
I wonder where it is, I thought.
Is it trapped?
Has it lost its way?
Is it cowering in a quiet corner somewhere?
Has it been stolen?
Accidentally transported elsewhere?
Maybe it was hit by a car, and now it’s dead by the side of the road under a bush?
These things happen, I thought.
In the bog-standard trees I stood alone.
The breeze sharpened.
Those clouds I mentioned grouped together and conspired to blocked out the sun.
White with a black spot.
A domestic shorthair.
To my right the sound of laughter.
Some people sharing a joke behind a garden fence.
Male laughter with a silver-lining of female.
I wondered what could be so amusing.
Emerging from the trees I gazed across the faded-green fields.
Monday morning.
The people of a close-by house are missing a cat.
It’s not that serious.
Not really.
But it might be trapped somewhere.
In a garden shed or a vacated house.
If so I won’t see it.
I can’t go snooping in people’s gardens.
And why should I?
It’s not my cat.
My cat went missing three years ago.
Vanished without a trace.
I did everything I could to find it.
Put up posters, told the neighbours, listed it online.
Not one response.
No-one has seen hide nor hair of it since.
Three years ago.
14 years old it was.
The last time I saw it was at dusk.
As fate would have it I took a photo as it skipped along the top of the wall at the end of our garden.
What are the odds of that!
I actually have a photograph of my cat at the moment I saw it last.
Three years ago it is, since he vanished without a trace.
Not one response.
So now I search for other people’s missing cats.
At random, you understand, when I see a poster, like today.
White with a black spot.
A domestic shorthair.
It’s lost and I am looking.
I miss my cat.