" A Man Walking "

I woke just as false dawn gave way

and as I sat on the edge of my bed
I noticed a darkly colored figure

striding away purposefully,
as he disappeared around the corner

of the empty street and building
he was lost to my sight

and I thought, 'Is this a sign?' 
since my Grandfather Larkin's 'Inside' name

was "A Man Walking"?

I continue to sit and watch

the urban landscape

as my cat slept

and I found a quietness

that pain usually lacks as the weeks slip away

and though there was a police car

followed by four other cars

in quick but silent succession

I felt comfortably

alone

in the silence of this time,

neither day or night

~and I knew

 I had to get up to write this poem!

" Kuro Neko " ~ Black Cat

INTRODUCTION:

Once upon a dream I stalked the night, elegant in sleek fur, but a Black Leopard or merely a black cat?  

Wrapped with the dark majesty of evening's civility and loss of detail I choose my own way to walk with a purpose....

While around me taxis moved in increments of snarls while the homeless chose doorways to sit, to stare or to beg or chat

 Enjoying their admiration and none of their lack, I moved with stealth, boldly choosing "I' over their need for 'us'.

 With whiskers to thrill to the night's enticing siren and eyes that probed the darkness that was a light to me 

 I moved past the smells of loneliness and homelessness and lost hopes shriveled in the bitter wind-my goal in mind 

 if not yet in my sight, and I feel the reflective strength of my wild brother flexing our union from every lurking tree 

 knowledge and cunning, courage and cowardice find means to intertwine,

like different shaped leaves on the same vine.

♥

“ Song of Bright Aspen Dove “

I remember the shaman

      The night my grandfather died

         Alike old men, too old for smells or war

             But I don’t remember what they said, if they spoke

      Other than the call to the spirits we were allowed to overheard

              Whether any understood it but them, or not.

               My Grandfather and the shaman, I mean, the spirits know more than they tell.

I remember the shaman

       Refused to allow me to meet his eyes the night my grandfather died

          Alike old men, caught in a past more real to them than to me,

            Plenty buffalo, much coup, animals that begged to selected because there were

                 So many others to fill the pots, to fill the bellies, to make babies strong

                         Days I don’t believe any more than I do him.

I remember the shaman, but not what he said

        Beyond the chants meant to draw the spirit world near so my grandfather wouldn’t

                  Have to make the journey to the night fires in the sky alone.

                        Where others waited, who’d know the days the old shaman claimed.

            Though it lessened his prestige because he couldn’t make the buffalo calls

                   Draw them to the channel sand the gullies like his grandfather

     But I think he said they listened to the white eyes thunder and were afraid ~

          But I think he said they listened to the white eyes thunder and were afraid ~

       Like we children were, when the Spirits rose across the plains on their horses

                    made of thunder and Grandfather seemed to want to join the night fires

                 Where dancing and boasting and jesting and gamboling were without malice

              Plenty buffalo, much coup, animals that begged to selected because there were

                           So many others to fill the pots, to fill the bellies, to make babies strong

And I remember,

       The shaman as my grandfather breathed his last, without words, he seemed to shrink

           As if a part of him left with his younger brother, leaving him alone

                 Alike old men, caught in a past more real to them than to me,

                                   And I remember,

        When they sent me for water

          to hide the face that my grandfather’s spirit had escaped

             at last to where his dreams waited…that he stopped to brush aside the leaves

                      near my knee and lapped, where I could hear it, then rose to the night sky

                         in the form of a snowy owl, and I remembered.

                               As I do now.

“ Shadow Dancer “

14.

Cat follows me from the bed, stiff with resignation; he’d been soundly asleep,

when I leaned over and stroked the silken whiteness of his fur, rising him slowly

to accept that I was leaned near him, but he didn’t have to struggle free, I was awake.

Sometimes he leaps in fright, then wakes, I would too if a bulldozer rolled on me,

Sometimes he seems to desire to cling to sleep, his paws kneading,

as at his mother’s side, nestled beside his long ago brothers and sisters, and sometimes

he pulls away from me, penning my hand where he can keep it under control.

He’s begun to meow lately, initiating contact rather than merely responding, but I

am made to know this view is still strictly under his control.

I guess he finally believed me when I told him he was a cat?

Even children separate themselves and return to rest at the side which gave them life,

So I feel cherished as he rests at my side, having given me back my life,

But worse, I enjoy tormenting him with silent meows-it doesn’t work-

In the dark of the night he still calls loudly when he wants to be heard….

But come to think of it…if he meowed silently in the dark, how would I even know?

.