1

He had a voice with a bite
     of Brooklyn, New York.
His name was Sancho, a sealpoint,
     and he preferred shrimp to Dostoevsky.
He taught other cats how to dance
     the cat-walk, teetering
On the edge of a 2 bedroom apartment.
     He enjoyed arching for spring
On the tops of inside doors.
     His last exit was in Philadelphia,
Not Brooklyn -- He loved life,
     and drooled when muuzhed.

      2

Ricky was orange and came from
     a Philadelphia dock, where
Longshoremen unloaded fruit from
     ships out of Chile. He slept
a lot, and sometimes pounced on
     shadows and hallucinations.
Once he leapt from table to sink,
     lost velocity, fell short
and long like a case of clementines
     in the lower hold. Well, what
do you expect? He was a longshoreman,
     not a ballet dancer.

      3

Sam's early education was in
     a parking lot, in Worcester,
Massachusetts. He was shattered
     into numerous pieces like a jigsaw
puzzle when a car ran over him.
     Fortunately, the doctor liked
puzzles and put Sam back together
     into a black and white cat.
He (Sam) has an excellent sense of humor
     when he's asleep: he laughs
loudest at lightbulb dreams and how many
     mice it takes to change them.

      4

Sometimes I dream of navigation: These
     cats are with me on the bridge--
We spread canvas on the deck,
     where we paint the ocean
           on which we sail,

wild with whitecaps


and s p i n d r i f t.

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