Dry-clean Only

Let’s see… it’s your soul.
It was delivered to you
at birth as a gift.
What? Why are you so surprised?
The usual birthday gift.

Has your grandmother
ever presented to you…
let us say… mittens?
All grandmothers love to knit
cute motley mittens, I know.

You got your present.
You adore your new mittens
(and your grandmother)
and treat them grandmotherly.
(Oh, what a great word I found!)

You wear them with care.
You scold yourself for foul spots.
You wash and sew up,
any stain and any hole…
Do you remember that day?

You think, Tomorrow!
You say, ‘It’s a seamy side…’
Fading in the wash,
shrinking, getting out of shape…
Small stuff. The mittens! Big deal!

Where are your mittens?
Now it’s a dirty duster.
It doesn’t fit even
for the second-hand strip mall,
not to speak of paradise…

Quite right, paradise!
What? Why are you so surprised?
You forgot, buddy!
I tell you about your soul.
These mittens are just a trope.

by TETIANA ALEKSINA
© All rights reserved 2015

GUEST POST // Triune-Heart by Madam Marmoset

Pussy willow, pussy willow,
Where have you gone?
Hiding far away
From the madding throng.

Her feeble paw stretched out in a futile attempt to grab his attention. There was a new cat on the block, lean and lithe and graceful. The old cat had been ravaged by age and sorrow. Her face and body showed every single line of her life, every punch that had been thrown at her.

He sat there between his two lady loves, happy, content and blissful, blissful in the love that filled the room.

The old cat continued to stay lit upon his lap. He instinctively stroked her, tenderly, gently and often. She mewled and purred with pleasure.

The young newcomer quietly took up a position near the old cat. She was in sacred space now. The old cat was battered and bruised. Her beauty had been washed away by the tsunami of time. The new cat was a delicious mystery, exotic and unknown. That they should exist, side by side in harmony, in respect, was sublime. Pure love would prevail.

Energy shifts, exchanges, grows and releases. It sends forth its light into the universe. Somewhere, all this love and energy must have gathered to form starlight.

The old cat stirred restlessly. Yowling, she clawed into his hand gently, yet not enough to draw blood. She was weary and defeated. Her world was changing, crumbling. Chips were coming away and cracks appeared, but they were not enough for the eternal light of love to shine through. She shivered, cold and battered.

The young cat saw this and approached. She nuzzled the old cat lovingly. “You’re not old yet,” she was saying. “I need you to love me. I need you to teach me how to love this man. I need you to share this love with me.”

Sharing love, there’s a thought. If love is infinite, why should it not be shared? Starlight never fades. The universe is endless. Time flows, and life with it. Just as the shore changes over time with the tides, so love evolves, eroded by heartbreak that clears away the briar so that love’s purest nectar can come to rest.

The old cat stirred and wakened. She nudged her head against his arm. She noticed the new cat lying beside her. In a moment bound in starlight, she touched the new cat, both receiving and giving love.

The man sits there, happy and content, his lady loves entwined and bound in love for each other… and love for him.

by MADAM MARMOSET
© All rights reserved 2015

Forbidden fruit

I’m grateful to my father
for Maupassant and Poe
who were forgotten on the highest shelf

If a book falls into my hands by itself
and says, “Read me, bro!”
would I really bother?

by TETIANA ALEKSINA
© All rights reserved 2015