creepy cat
in the 95-degree heat of a pointless jaunt to the calvary cemetery today i spotted a creepy, sickly-looking cat, after it emerged from behind a shrubbery-laden gravestone. i turned and saw the cat there, in plain view, having apparently made small steps from hiding and into the open, staring right at me all the while. i said “baby, what are you doing here? how did you get here?“ the cat had no tags that i could see, and its movement was deliberate and seemingly calculated, or choreographed. the cat would look at me, then look forward and take 2 or 3 steps toward the grave, then look back toward me while pausing for a few seconds, then repeat this little dance 4 or 5 times until disappearing into the hedges. it seemed strange to find a cat so far away from any human activity. this was by the Johnston Mausoleum, which is about as far from any adjacent places of business or activity as any spot at the cemetery. i lost the cat. i looked around for it, but if it retreated into the sahde of the bushes by the gravestone then it snuck away before i made it over there. there are plenty of graves — thousands upon thousands — behind which a cat could hide at calvary. the searing look in its eyes disturbed me. such a tiny creature, such a serious look of disdain, a worldly look. it reminds me of aconversation i had with a kid who lived in ht eprojects. he was underage but drinking rum and cokes at a bar, and we talked about this and that. once in a while, in response to something irevealing i said about myself, he would say “man, i just saw you!“ at first i did not know what to make of the remark, and i even thought i had mis-heard it, but he said it several times in such a way that i felt like he knew me, knew my kind, and that i had no secrets that i could keep from him. i felt this cat at calvary today saying the same thing: “i see you.“
