"Kitty's Legacies: An ode"
By Teguh Santoso
Kitty's returned home,
leaving me alone @apartment.
Can't believe my kitty's gone to heaven,
where its god Felix reigns.
8 days ago catching a cold,
and wearing a respiratory mask,
I found a helpless kitty
near a Tanjung Duren canteen.
No hesitation did I bring
Kitty to my home apartment
though I had given its mom,
a second chance she wasted
3hours later.
Day by day passed,
sleepless and restless have I been.
Yet I kept thinking of you, Kitty,
and skipped some lunch time to milkfeed you.
Colleagues at the swimming pool gazed,
relatives mocked this Kitty's daddy,
kids at school adored you,
friends at choir baffled for your meow,
I myself have wondered why I raised you.
Then, yeah, it paid off.
Kitty, you taught me some mothership values:
Cares, feeling upset, worries, smiles.
Yes, I felt slimmer, restless at nite,
missing your cries to wake me up.
Once my faith was even shaken,
on that day 3 morning,
praying to God to give you
the best place and babysitter--
you're with god Felix in cats' heaven now--
as I used to have nauseas & murmurs,
for getting up and down for your thirst.
Well, Kitty, now the game's over.
Life must go on. You're there,
watching me with a baby pet bottle,
still lukewarm for this Tuesday supper,
to practice what a veterinarian taught,
how to milkfeed, and now I don't have
a kitty to feed with my SGM LLM milk.
Poor you, Kitty, or ...poor me,
being left in this lonesome world.
Meow ... meow ... did I hear it
from the styrofoam box?
Just my imagination, ...
And why on earth should you
return to this cold world?
Sayonara, Kitty. Au revoir.
I'm in grief, but happy for you,
and for my new life,
for the lessons I gained,
from an 8-day-old male Kitty.
