Old Cat And Mouse

When Cat killed Mouse
we rejoiced and were appalled:

rejoiced at old Cat
and his obvious pride,

his swatting at Mouse
after the fact, that look on his face

that said, “You never expected
this of me, didja?”

Appalled at the mere presence
of Mouse, his laid out body

a testament to just how much
we’d learned not to expect,

how easily we’d forgotten how old
and full of holes this house is,

how obvious it was that it was not proof
against the normal incursions —

and more appalled than that, perhaps,
at the idea that old Cat (who mostly

sleeps and eats and begs for scraps
and steals those scraps then sleeps again)

is so much more on the ball than we
at what goes on around here.