900 Dollars To Kill a Cat ~ Audrey Lorraine

before, during, and after like snapshot polaroid flashes

of sticky summer heat memories intertwined with glued

shut eyes and too cold skin.

 

it wasn’t winter when he died but i was shivering anyway,

and it was like everyone said it would be: the most unnatural,

natural thing in the world.

 

i was unable to put a single thought into words other than

he doesn’t like to be cold, he wants to be at home with me,

purring and warm and alive.

 

but we were there in the room, and he was already dead.

 

if i was any better at all of this i would say something like

on my deathbed there’s going to be several moments where

the grief of losing him still overtakes me,

 

overwhelms me to the point of breathless lungs, will steal

the soul from my body without remorse. there won’t be a

thing i can do about it and i’ll like it that way.

 

it’ll feel the same as all of those things that are too small for

words and too big to ignore. nose touches and head buts and

gentle, sighing purrs through a thread bare stick thin body

fighting and kicking its way to gentleness.

 

when it was all said and done i didn’t have the cash to

keep him in a box, so they put him in a plastic bag,

still warm, and threw him in the trash.

 

if, in grief stricken stolen floods of darkness and horror,

i riffled through the dumpster out back to see if i could

find him, you’ll have to forgive me.

 

i just wanted to make sure—wherever he was going,

wherever they were taking him—he was making it there

safe.