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I knew the cat was going to die
Even as I got up to give it
It’s three a.m. feeding
The two-week-old refuge
Abandoned by its mother
As a lost cause,
While I was determined
To save it
Knowing I could not,
Was not good enough
And all I could do
After trying for five days
Is rest its tiny head on my chest
And listen to its whimpers,
Its small head smaller than
The spade of a tea spoon
I petted with my thumb.
I imagined it purring
When I knew it was in pain.
With its eyes still closed,
He never saw me, only
Heard my voice,
Felt my touch,
Caught my scent.
The mother had left
The tiny creature
In our neighbor’s driveway
Where it cried until
The neighbor rescued it
And delivered it to us,
Like a gift from the gods,
As if believing we could save it,
And at first, I thought I could,
Feeding it condensed mill
For the first day
Until the shipment
Of kitten milk arrived,
And though it cried often,
It greedily accepted the food
Via eye dropper,
Though we later realized
It was cold
And put a heat pad
In its carrier
To replace the heat
Of his mother
For those times when
We could not keep him warm
By holding him.
We did not do everything right,
Failing to provide him food
Every two hours,
And the heat pad aggravatingly
Shut off after a half an hour,
Causing him to get cold
During those hours we slept,
He was cold when
I picked him up after work
On that last day,
And I accepted the vigil
Of warming him,
Turning on the oven,
Carrying him wrapped in towels
As I pressed him against my chest,
He no longer wanted food,
A certain sign of him
Imminent demise
Still I held out hope
Staying awake
The whole of the night,
Packing him up
For the trip to the vet
In the morning
Where I learned
His body temperature
Had dropped dangerously low
And though they pumped
Up the heat in his carrier,
He soon passed out
Of our world,
Mouth open as if
To utter one last cry
Only I could hear.
I came home to
The vacancy of my kitchen,
The place that has served
As his sanctuary
And I ached to have
His small body
Curled up in the
Palm of my hand
As it once had,
To feel his soft fur
Against my thumb,
To see his small mouth
Suck the tip of the
Eyedropper,
The collection of which
Now sat abandoned
On the counter,
Pointless,
This visitor leavings its mark
In me as much in those
Five days, than other cats
Had over decades.
I know I will miss him,
Just as I still miss
Some people who have
Gone out without me.
I know I was
Inadequate to the task,
Aching to save him
When he could not be saved,
Thinking if I had done
This or that differently,
He might have survived,
A notion others dispel
But I know better,
Having failed humans
In similar ways,
With no way to go back
To repair it.
He’s gone,
In every place
Except my heart,
He will remain there
Always.
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