a new scar

I awoke once again, as if i had just fallen asleep, as if yesterday was too soon. My mornings are common. If not an electronic device dispelling a lucid reality or a cloud of nicotine rupturing the senses, it's a minority completing a front yard task too time consuming for a corporate yuppie. At least it wasn't a Freudian nightmare this time as my undependable memory recalls. Before I could create my reality, I glanced at the clock, demanding my presence be at the "Friday side" of morning street sweeping day. So I walk a few blocks down, circle the premises to find a parking spot, all while shoving my irritation down an unhealthy lung. Mental motivational speeches sound like "well at least you aren't in debt another 35 american dollars." In this respect, awaking early is a walk in the park. So I stagger back to my bed and fall asleep for another hour and a half.

Awoken again, I go to the kitchen, build some coffee, and protein drink. This window is where I reside most of the time I am at home, if not in my room. But something's irregular. The spire fan that i placed within the window sill is gone. It's outside, broken on the floor actually. A surge if instinct and logic overwhelm me as I call out my kitten's name. After twenty minutes of frantic searching and mess making, a stark reality unfolds. I am without her presence. I know instantly as i did twenty minutes before denial, that she had fallen through the window with the fan. Rude awakenings take a while to set in for me, so I pause and continue my day a little off beat. Then acceptance approaches with a kick to the stomache.

I make my way to kinkos of all ass-raping places and make copies of the cutest picture. I almost couldn't accept this reality. It is difficult to tell yourself that you are making missing fliers of an entity you are undoubtedly connected to. It's hard to hold back tears when you decide what to advertise in this flier. You can't sell it short. When you look at it during it's construction, you shift to auto-pilot, with the sensation of emotional involvement and objective clarity. Kinkos is evil but justifiable for desperation.

I post forty fliers, sweeping two streets in each direction. Kyoto is worth more paper than that copy shop, but my wallet accommodates only the minimal. I then go back to the apartment and keep my telephone company, waiting in anticipation, worried in anticipation.

Now I am writing, with all but longing for a creature which surpassed any limiting definition of companionship. I tried Rumi and Sigur Ros to sober me from this pain. I've O.D.'ed on nostalgia and the possibilities Kyoto's suffering have passed uncounted reel to reel scenarios. I meditate on her safety. Kyoto has lost her traditional survival skills. However, if she were to ever encounter another human being, she will be in good shape because she has cultivated, unintentionally, the spiritual survival skills of compassion and adoration. No one is capable of resisting this affection.

Today, as hard as it is to type now, my soul has been scarred. I am without the physical presence of Kyoto. She was more than my companion. She was my teacher. She found me, not otherwise. She accepted me as a pupil, as I learned more from her than I could ever from a person. I have felt her teach me lessons I cannot accurately explain. When I would sit in the living room floor to think, she would summersault into my lap, inferring to stop thinking because charisma and play can achieve more than thinking can. When I feel distressed, I would look to her by chance, receiving a specific squinting that I believed was a form of sympathy, which taught that companionship is a great remedy for worldly shortcomings and trivialities.

We were alike. Kyoto sits at the windowsill, as probably many cats do. However, I would look at her as she would. I believed that what we had in common this way was our infinite longing for love and constant curiosity of simple things. The most simple things are the most complex. I think we both believed this.

The memory that will never leave me is the time I first took her home. She was half the size she is now. It can be expressed closely like this poem I wrote about her one day.

an organic alarm

Awaking from the drum rolls of her breath,

the muted chords are played upon my back

like morning sunlight beaming through my lids.



I then recoil, her primal love comb grates

my skin. I fancy her affection though

her kisses strip the externalities.



And sleeping to the drum rolls of her breath,

the muted chords are played upon my back…

a melody from a Calico cat.



Rumi once wrote a verse such as "Personality is a small dog trying to get the soul to play." Kyoto's personality blossomed my soul always. Her unconditional affection has stained me and the last lesson I learned from her was of the futility of emptiness or what some might say "the straight line." I would rather be a wave. I still hope for her. I will continue to look for you Kyoto. Will you look for me?


Though I'm in Kyoto
When the Cuckoo Sings,
I long for Kyoto. -->Basho