Branta Felis Catus

They stand on the roof edge of the condominiums that lie between my building and the river.  Canada Geese, a mating pair staring and hissing two stories down at Ginger, domestic cat.

Ginger, she owns these buildings.  She roams freely on and off the elevators, up and down the halls.  Just last week she let out a meow on the other side of my door.  She did not want to come in.  She had simply grown impatient waiting for the elevator doors to open.  She knew I was there, on the other side of the my door and she was going to demand my attention and command my performance to send her back to the ground floor, back to her Bonnie and Bert.

In the morning Bert steps out his ground floor deck for a smoke and to inspect the yard between these buildings, his responsibilities.  Ginger always steps out to keep his company and to lord over the building that is her domain.

Recently she has had to guard her realm from these interlopers, these seasonal menace to her world.  Who are these giant birds?  How dare they invade her territory, her responsibility.  How dare they hiss at her from the safe perch of the roof edge.  Are the chicken? Why will they not come down and fight properly?

She hisses back.  An orchestration of honk, hiss, meow, hiss reverberates between the buildings wafting upwards to my vantage point nine floors up.  I am tempted to join in, to honk meow howl and hiss, to cause further confusion to the animals establishing their place. 

I do not.  They will work it out.  These birds, this cat, they will let each other know they are each there and they both deserve a place in this space.  They will grow to respect and cooperate.  Unlike we humans they are not competitive.  In time these birds will become wards of Ginger.  She will grow to accept them as part of her building and she will guard over them and their pending goslings as if they were her own.

Her neat little world: humanus branta felis catus consensus.

My Angels Gift

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, it hurts beyond belief

Walk with me please, parental trust my grief

Walk with me please, protect my wards and me

Walk with me please, I have failed, save me

Why is this mind trapped inside this soul?

Expression incapable, my purpose, my role

Essence is lacked the feelings be dormant

Wait growth to explode an angel my moment

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, friendship elusive

Walk with me please, alone it's conclusive

Walk with me please, life’s partner I crave

Walk with me please, this search I’m a slave

I can see it so clearly that what needs done

Childhood friendship loyalty, cruel fun

The logic informs the role play to delude

Those unaware, affliction of mind is renewed

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, my heart first ache

Walk with me please, first kiss we did take

Walk with me please, our souls moment mingle

Walk with me please, we part spirit again single

You exposed me to life, emotion, sensation

You tore it from soul sealed memory relation

I have not forgot, this thing it so powerful

Again I will gain it, minds crypt will open full

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, with thee do I wed

Walk with me please, a mistake I am dread

Walk with me please, why lead me this path

Walk with me please, my life feels of death

Be responsible you do it, right thing that you must

Expected of me, get a job prove your trust

The world has plans, your role it is chosen

What of my plans my dreams shattered explosion

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, this father I will be

Walk with me please, why would you chose me

Walk with me please, confusion fear abound

Walk with me please, tiny lives sculpture’s sound

The soul of my daughter her path lies with God

The soul of my daughter hewn by hands she does build

The soul of my son a life to lead active

The soul of my son dreams path not be passive

Why did you choose me?

I did not ask for this.

Why did you choose me?

I do than you alone for this.

Walk with me please, first cycle renews

Walk with me please, lifeless soul temporary is new

Walk with me please, why can’t I always feel so

Walk with me please, cruel joke seals me low

Responsible man of noblise oblige

Commitment was kept, now imminent release

Soul sealed low needs freedom to fly

Exposure to pain, to grief, break rely

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, do you disapprove

Walk with me please, can you feel me renew

Walk with me please, suppress me no more

Walk with me please, my prayer, open this door

Life’s art overwhelms my role insecure

Life’s love is shown me, will this truly endure

Suspicious am I this logical mind

Retreats all too often to comfort to find

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, my dark now has light

Walk with me please, this power seems so right

Walk with me please, I fear for the others

Walk with me please, who have freed me this power

Delineate our features face to face we do bear

Penciled expression closed features, simple and rare

Water the colours flow outside our outlines

Co-mingle they settle new feature defines

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, my light has confused

Walk with me please, rights wrong has renewed

Walk with me please, this logic it has suffered me

Walk with me please, this sensitive why suffers she

New colours comingled need space they need breath

Our colours comingled they are birth from souls death

Respect you do know me your sensitive mystery

Rejuvenation ebb then flow, blessing does christen me

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.

Walk with me please, angel in tune with this new spirit

Walk with me please, your gift will return do not fear it

Walk with me please, colours will wash renewed over and over

Walk with me please, erase lines one essence new power

Life’s path has taken a journey this far

From different place minds pattern joined a new star

Erupts to the cosmos new souls life’s respect

Logic and reason, sensitive and emotion, do connect

Why did you choose me?  This was all so very hard

Why did you choose me?  The path to this place so awkward

Why did you choose me?  This occupation, so much remains

Why did you choose me?  Dark has new glow, light a new stain

Why did you choose me?

I don’t want this.  So I fought.

Why did you choose me?

I didn’t want this.  So I thought.

Why did you choose me?

I am grateful am honoured

Why did you choose me?

Existence, vivacity, verve, a new energy

Seeing Me Seeing You

Do you still see me?  I still see you.  You are right here, in this place, in my head.  I see you.

I lost you for awhile.  I was stuck in me.  I was stuck in you seeing me.  I was stuck here, in this place, in my head, only in me.

I didn’t see you.

You needed me to see you, only you.  I needed to see you.  Me seeing you, out of this place, in my head, only you.

I see you. 

I do.

Febreeze

So like there’s this perfume thingy in my place you know and it like sprays stuff out when I walk close to it.  The smell is nice but it is weird and I like hate the sound as it comes.  Ya know that phewt noise.  It squirts without letting me know so sometimes I like get so surprised and it squirts all over my clothes.  Ewwww and that smell sticks to everything.  I like that smell but on my clothes, well like no way.   Sometimes, when a friend comes to visit who might be allergic or not like the smell I move the perfumey thing to a closet.  But it hides waiting for me in there cause after awhile I open the closet door and it goes phewt and spreads its smell all over.  If I am quick I can close the closet door before the phewt sprays all over me but then the smell goes phewt all over the towels and the toilet paper and the paper towels and the cleaning stuff and stuff.  And that smell can be so like intense.  It makes me feel sick all over but then I put it back again on the shelf in the living room and I try to sneak around it so it doesn’t phewt all over me again and again cause the smell is like nice when it is in the air but not too much right and like its lousy on my clothes and especially my skin.  I like this thing cause it is cute but in a weird way cause it also phewts stuff out.  It is cute like a skunk is cute but not as stinky but still stinky you know.

This Snows Last Gasp

The ducks, normally a cacophony of squawk as they perform their mating rituals through the night, have gone silent.  The geese normally flying and gliding in paired acquaintance seeking nesting places, have landed in wait.

Snow, it falls lending an aura of clean to the city’s grey blue night light.  It falls spread thick and wet upon the roofs of cars and buildings below.  Grass newly awakened by recent warm sun is smothered into a new blanket of bald moisture.  It attaches, providing a thick white silhouette to branches of elm and oak trees planted into the flood waters of the river.

The waters have gone smooth in the still cool air.  Cold waters warmer than space surrounding release their mists mixing old waters with new only to return again as snow cold, clean, and beautiful.

Light from houses, from street lights, from buildings pierce the mist and falling powder.  Glow is sharpened in the still misty air, beacons of welcome, radiance of familiar.  Two crosses, from hospital and school, illuminate their faith into the mystery of this spring fall.

Warmth and optimism remain in season as our prairie again renders reminder of our place.  This too will pass, this snows last gasp.

Stroke

A brush will provide clarity

To life’s long brevity

Experiences, community

Friendships, affectionately

Behold be held

In weakness meld

Blood stress pressed skull

Hostage, life may be killed

Fortune of care

Position place to pair

Chance peril now aware

Life’s risk is to share

Caution to wind not so

Future known not yet, lo

Life’s interests, love to know

Deep caring love’s wondrous show

It is so worth it

Face forward no longer sit

Recovery’s exposure writ

Life’s love experience wit

Companion

The sun spreads morning light filling the dark voids

Luminance bounces from the east reflecting from surface exposed

Into the open sash glazed refraction to his rooms

They wake together light and he, begrudging slumber last sleep

It drives last dark from furniture and fittings, cloth and structure

Revealing pattern, his neatly contained and lonely world

His eyes they open always east, morning invading from behind

Fitful sleep succumbs to days first words: “good morning”

To space divan, had space been filled be space divine

This place is neat, this half bed made, pillows fluffed, always there

It never moves for this mans slumber reveres this place his morning eyes

Seeking sadly his companion, his life’s partner, where does she lie?