Philosophy Lesson

These are not my cats nor my window. However the cats could have been Carl Sigmund Cat (called Sig or Siggie or Sigmund) and Jonathan Livingston Cat (mostly called Livvie), both long ago dead. Livvie was all black with red highlights in the fur when the light hit it just right. He was just about the most cowardly cat in the world for his size. He was huge. Sigmund loved to go on walks with us.

This is actually tongue in cheek. I hope. Years ago in a small gathering a guy said, "Life is hard. Then you die." It was the first time I heard that and it made a huge impression. I think this is graffiti that somebody claims is a Hemingway quote. I love it.

Unfortunately the spare nature of the quote is often a longer drawn out process in real life. Life is hard. Then you suffer for ages. Then you circle the drain for a while. Then you die. I am somewhere between the second and third sentences though my "suffering" while limiting is not painful.

Elsewhere I have been taught that this limitation is a gift, a teaching that comes from the life source. School has always been easy for me. I worked hard not to get straight A's so I wouldn't be noticed by the shitheads who hate teachers' pets and think grades come from favoritism. That set the tone for school all the way back in the 1950's for me.

As for the poem... It is not a fabrication. I have had this situation in my actual life though not many bird carcasses near the seeds. Instead there was direct evidence that the birds caused the large scatterings of seeds and shells below the hanging feeder. I think the messiness of birds is one of nature's ways of reseeding the earth.

I have kept cats most of my adult life. I have always tried to keep them fed well enough with high nutrition food that they have small motivation to hunt. I think I have been fairly successful except that being on the hunt for a predator is probably the happiest moment in her life.

Philosophy Lesson

My cat said life's hard
and then she died. The neighbor
cat has taken hold
of my porch and hunts
the birds who drop down to eat
the sunflower seeds
which fall from the plate
under the rafter outside
my kitchen window.

Life is hard, they chirp,
and then they die, one by one.

December 27, 2010 2:52 AM