felix and felicity in poetry

the cat, our cat
we had to have his leg removed
to excise the cancer that was killing him
he was my father’s first and foremost
my dad is gone now, dead
Felix is a connection
back to him and those
seem fewer by the day

maybe I’m selfish
I don’t know and
I see the kitty limp along
gamely trying to adapt to it
but having trouble nonetheless
he’s slowly healing but he is
diminished and I wonder if
given the choice he would
have chosen to live three-legged
or to have died whole instead
I don’t know, I can’t he is
just a kitty cat and he has
stubbornly refused to learn
to speak English that I
might know his opinions
on that subject

so I hold Felix on my chest
at night when I am typing in
my bed, sleep schedule wrecked
by disease-quarantine layoffs
the kitty is my dear dear buddy
but I will admit
it is alien when his stitches
poke through my shirt from his
mending little body to my chest
it is unnerving when
I feel the bone and muscle left
from where his leg once was
trying in vain to manifest
shifting under knitting skin
not there and yet
his instinct tells
him should be there

I love him and
he loves me back
no longer pawing at my stubble
in appreciation as he has but
one toe-beaned paw to stabilize
himself so now he headbutts me
instead, his marking glands
telling the world that I am
his and he is mine as well and
yet that uneasy imcompletion
we both can feel it there

he wants to be strong
still felling birds and chippies
in the backyard as he no longer
can and so do I, I wish
my father was still here
to pet him and to tell me
I’m not crazy for feeling
so incomplete myself
so overwhelmed by complicated grief
by a world gone fucking mad
by time turned out of joint and
the comfort of schedule dashed to bits
on the rocks of cursed interesting times
holy shit but here we are anyway
this three-legged cat and
my half-sane half-crazy mind
trying to fake that we are strong
despite the ache of phantom limbs
we both can’t share the feeling
we’re both supposed to have
the phantoms of paws
of emotional stability
the phantom of
my dad

so here we are a perfect pair
of imperfect knaves
in these poorly-shuffled days
this stubborn little cat and I
uneasy with the difference yet
here for each other
for as long as fate allows
which is all we get
this is all we get
we are all limping at least a little
but we can crawl up with each other
time to time and
soothe each other for a little while
that’s all
that’s life
that’s all this life is
that

damaged me and tripod cat