INTRODUCTION: I am a philosophy major, and I have a cat. I didn't want a cat. She jumped out of the trash, drank my coffee, and followed me home. She was gross and bald and possessed an alarming hatred of kneecaps. She teaches me weird and important lessons, as God's great creatures often do. In this poem, I reference one of my favorite books, St. Augustine's De Magistro, and describe the disturbance of my contemplation by the "once bald gremlin" that I call my Adeodatus.



THE ONCE BALD GREMLIN: KAT

Once upon a thinking derailed by the bald
Skinny skulky trash-born kitty
Hater of the knees you've mauled
Painful past what a pity

Calling to me from the bin
My Adeodatus “Save me!”
Meowing in someone else's sin
Clawing clinging: something new

Watching both the laughing and crying
Sitting on my floor you stare
meowing “she's crazy but trying,
At least my butts no longer bare”

I turn inward to my Teacher
Prayer disturbed by the creature