The Brambles

"Grief is love's souvenir.
It is our proof that we once loved."
--Glennon Doyle Melton


You remember that time she got out?
she asks. Of course I do. Years ago,
early January, my brother was taking
care of our cats while we were away
for a few days, and we came home
well after dark to learn that somehow

the younger one had gotten out.

The ground was already covered
in a hard crust of snow and we were

instantly petrified. She never went

outside. She wouldn't know how to
survive, she might get confused and

not know where to come to be saved.

We rushed out into the darkness,

calling, hoping, desperate. We
could not bear the thought of
losing this sweet, affectionate
kitten who had found her way into
our hearts and never grew up.

We could not bear to think of her

afraid, or in pain.

But then, there came an answer.
An anxious mewing, up the hill.
And off my wife charged, straight
through the raspberry thicket to

where the frightened little cat

crouched, shivering, crying out

for rescue.

Tonight it is we who shudder; we

who wonder where home is now.

I would run through any amount
of brambles to have her back,
she says, remembering.
I didn't even feel them.

But we were always running

through the brambles.
We just never felt them

until now. The love we

gave and got has left us

scarred, a crosshatching
on our lives, every laceration
a treasure.

Minor Mendings

Cassie was just fine with the rain. There had been some thunder earlier as well, and that had been even better. Boom! Yes, that was the stuff. She wished she could make it thunder like that whenever she wanted. She'd see what Penny said then, oh yes.

She flicked her wings, where some of the rain had dripped onto her from overhead. Her house was good -- perfect, really, aesthetically speaking -- but it was admittedly not the most weather proof. It had lovely corded pillars of the yellow birch growing overhead, which formed archways out of its curving golden roots all around. Once there had been a "nurse" stump, where the birch had sprouted, and as the stump had rotted away it had left this open hollow where the birch's roots had come down on every side. As a house, it was magnificent; as a roof, it was serviceable, but every now and then the breeze would splatter rivulets across her.

( Grumpy fairy, and how she got that way... )