We Loved Our Kitty

BLACK Elijah’s gone away
To lay him down alone,
On a sullen, sultry day,
Fevered to the bone.

’Lijah got his Bible name
When he cooled his fur
Underneath the thicket-frame
Of the juniper.

On his belly and his throat,
Thrice, with fingers light,
Some stray gene had touched his coat
With a wisp of white.

’Lijah was a gentle soul,
Unprepared to pay
Dark distemper’s heavy toll
On that August day.

But this evening, in the wood,
In the snowdrift dunes,
I saw — ’Lijah? There he stood
With eyes like yellow moons.

When I called he ran to me,
Nothing wild or shy.
Feline personality
Looked me in the eye.

“Have you,” asked I, “spots of white?
Is it you?” He said:
“Look too close, in faith’s despite,
And you may prove me dead.

“There are moments when to pry
Is the greater pity.
’Lijah may indeed be I,
And I your neighbor’s kitty.

“Do not think, and do not ask.
Hold me while I purr.
What was ‘Lijah but a mask
Whose features fade and blur?

“Could Elisha surely tell
Who he still might be
When Elijah’s mantle fell
On his identity?

“You should know, though you are
man,
Selfhood hinges not
On the facts you once could scan,
But time can blend and blot.”

So I set him on his feet,
And so he left me there,
Stepping dainty, treading neat,
Walking on the air.

Far beyond our feeble call
’Lijah’s gone away.
Yet some fourth dimensional
Gave him back today.

He, for all I’ll ever ween,
Consorts with gnome and elf,
Heedless quite how that could mean
He transcends himself.

Black Elijah’s gone away:
So has Merlin gone.
Both, for all that I can say,
Are piping up the dawn.