Sunday, November 28, 2010

Learning Peace from a Cat



It's no secret that cats have their moments of quiet dignity. It's mysterious, and something that dogs seldom do: to sit for hours as if in reflection, zoned out in some Zen-like state of pure being. This can have a calming influence on we humans, if we are open to it. A year or so ago, Ana Darcy Méndez was enjoying being soothed by her cats after a harrowing experience (which will be recounted in the next Distant Cousin volume).




In that quiet moment with her cats, she remembered a poem she enjoyed. (Ana has read a creditable sample of our fiction, but she's not a fast reader in English or Spanish. She tends to enjoy poetry--some poetry--more, as being shorter and more condensed, and offering many opportunities for thoughts and reflections.) She searched the poem out and read it again.



The poem points out that cats teach us "preserving," in the words of the poet. He talks of their "amazing dignity" and their "affirmation of a vital life we humans can only...admire from afar." The word "afar" applies even though the cat may actually be quite close. No one can say where a cat goes when it turns inward, but this seemingly simple poem about the life lessons we can learn from cats is "exactly right," by Charles Bukowski (click "VickiB").



A poem about TWO cats

(More cat poems and other poems in the column to the right,
under the photo of the blue-eyed kitty-->)

Meet Ana Darcy!

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