Cats Of Cortona

Ashwyn Kale July 11, 2007

I could return here in my weakness to wilt among
ruined abbeys, to pass between worlds as sunlight
through glass, to be reborn as a cat rounded of age
and humour. I will recline upon walls as the farmer
waters his motley greens, back turned to plains
washed fertile by blood of thousands. I will stretch
and tuck, neatly as a hillside terraced since time
arose from its embryonic womb. I listen to the sisters
whispering exam-room secret prayers. I sidle around the
empty stalls of yesterday and year, donkeys consigned
to watercolour nostalgia in the tourist shops. I have
Cortona under my feet, one splayed step at a time
ascending to a templar oak and bells too rusted
to ring or to live. I came here for forgiveness and I
must stay awhile. Wait: patience the firmly fallow street
of few footfalls. Eyes smitten and closed, sundown of
planets hurling their final, futal cry, dust again
my always and only treasure, I stay.