Suffused with this winter's morning light
the drapery glows a gentle eggshell white
casting stripes stretched across a blue floor
umbric bars breaking space up a little more.
The clock ticks and it tocks, the cars pass by,
the lone piano quietly drinks in their sound.
Its silent keys, its hidden strings give no reply,
but stand still with light and questions all around.
In the kitchen window a spindly naked tree
reaches beyond the curtains' faux floral lace.
Descending from her sun-basking, now I see
my cat climbing up the couch, and to my face.
She puts paws to my belly and begins to knead.
My hands brush her aside, but don't succeed,
as she deftly returns to the task at hand
for reasons only felines must understand.
It could be she was a baker in her former life,
who filled mornings punching dough for bread.
Away from pastry-cases, she was a devoted wife
even years-after her husband fell ill and dead.
Perhaps she also had a piano not unlike my own
where their faded photos and portraits would alight:
family, youth, and love, like birds who'd never flown;
and her hands would play by the curtains' white
simple scales and preludes to how things used to be
for her husband, for herself, for the naked spindly tree.
Now her paws have paused to rest,
and after purrs, her green eyes pour
a glance imbued with some request
to me, the piano, then the floor.
