Indoor Outside Cat
There are only small chances to escape.
Her harness, though restricting,
is the key to the patio door,
but her mother will be gone until Thursday.
The door by her food is opened regularly,
but only leads to spiders’ homes, metal devices,
and a roaring machine her keeper uses to go outside.
Why does the keeper use that machine?
Outside is not scary like that machine, but
quiet and wondrous like the equally baffling shower
whose mouth spouts nothing but hot water and
does nothing but make her mother smell different.
She must get out in to the open,
into the sunlight unpolluted by windows.
She can almost feel the wind in her whiskers and taste
the pine needles and cold grass.
Maybe if she sings her feelings her keeper will understand.
The keeper likes to nuzzle her mate at the front door
when he leaves in the morning.
Longing for a sniff of something earthier
than the dust in the litter box, she advances
undeterred, even purring. She will map out
every inch of that grassy space. An indoor cat
at home in her outside place.
