What shape is my cat , you ask ?

Well, I honestly cannot say.

It depends upon the box she picks

to sit inside that day.

 

A birthday around the corner ?

I can, with confidence, declare –

My cat, till another box comes by,

will definitely be square.

 

New Shapes do not faze her,

Neither does large or small.

Cloth, cardboard, styrofoam

She’s willing to try them all.

 

And it’s not just quirky boxes

that catch her curious eye,

She’ll take the shape of anything

That she happens to come by –

 

Round in a bucket and

straight on window-ledge,

Curved in Amma’s sling-bag and

Wavy on garden-hedge,

 

Bumpy amongst cupboard-clothes,

Flat on our kitchen floor,

Squished between the wall and our

Living room wooden door.

 

Fearless in adventure

Yet cautions and alert

She checks before she snuggles in

A freshly ironed shirt.

 

She moves from situation to

situation with perfect ease,

with not a moment of protest

Or a forehead-crease.

 

You must have realized by now

What I’m driving at –

Guess there is a thing or two

To learn from my pet cat.

— Little Ravikiran

— Created and complied with love by Archana Savnal & Jyothi Divgi.

— Published in ‘The Chitrapur Sunbeam’ Vol. No. XXII, August 2015, Issue no. 8