A Cat is Just a Cat, but
lately I see the cat and feel a love for her
that is sharp and unexpected. I look at her
(looking at me) and realize I understand her
perfectly. How is that possible? She catches
my eyes and holds them. I don’t know
what she wants, and yet there’s a purity
and simplicity of intention there. I know
she wants something—a treat? To go out?
To be stroked? But, not knowing what,
yet I understand perfectly her wanting,
and then I understand that slight frown
of frustration at my not knowing what she
wants,
and then she rubs her head against my ankle,
and
I understand perfectly that she thinks she
needs
to win me over, and when her tail starts to
swish,
I understand perfectly what is escalating
there…
so I move to the door to see if she follows
or turns toward the cat dish or…--eventually
I figure it out. Sometimes I even come to see
that she doesn’t know what she wants, is
feeling
bad and wants me to do something about it.
But long before I know what she wants,
I understand her perfectly.
I get the intention, that insistent, gripping
look.
It’s pure, free of significance, like a phrase
from a late Beethoven string quartet, just a
few notes
that ping home a longing or exultation. It’s
music.
How can this be? Because nearly all of
communication
is recognition. A Zulu greeting translates “I
see you.”
The cat sees me. I see the cat. I see that
she sees me.
She sees that I see her.
A person can go for lifetimes starving for
this.
can be so numbed to the possibility of it
(What parent ever sees the child, what child
its parent?)
that it is a shock when it ambushes him
from a book, movie, song…or even a cat
It is often said that cats are hard to
understand
or that women or men or children are beyond
understanding.
I see this and understand it. This puzzlement
is as clear and simple as the cat’s when she
is frustrated
by my perfect failure to understand.
