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In the Eyes of a Dumb Beast

In the eyes of a dumb beast
I glimpsed deep peace
offered without surcease,
nature’s impartial feast.

To fear all creatures respond.
Animals move on, knowing how
on the hunt to browse
on the here and now,
which tastes of nothing beyond.

After Rainer Maria Rilke (original in French, Vergers n° 54 Pléiade p. 1007)

J’ai vu dans l’œil animal
la vie paisible qui dure,
le calme impartial
de l’imperturbable nature.

La bête connaît la peur ;
mais aussitôt elle avance
et sur son champ d’abondance
broute une présence,
qui n’a pas le goût d’ailleurs.


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Puss and Boots

A cat allowed her table scraps
Is how it has begun, this dim

Dutch I’ve heard for years
And now must learn.

Dishes fix the azimuth
Of which one caught your words,

“Something’s wrong. I watch
Myself as if I am not here”.

A dial tone replaced your voice,
The response I couldn’t find.

The clever kitty scoots away.
The waiter makes his rounds.

The harried waiter speaks in Dutch
I somehow understand.

He leaves. I try these sounds
To the lure the puddy back again.

“Dear Boots, now but the moon
Can bounce my worry up to you.

We are both cats, must live
From paw to mouth like them.”

 


***
It was in 1989. I was in Curaçao calling back to Edmonton. That would have been over a satellite-linked landline, which faded out in the middle of our exchange. Was it because there was a full moon, lunar flares? In any event, there was a stray cat under the tables, one known to and tolerated by the staff. Although I was in Curaçao to study the local creole, Papiamentu, I was also trying to be at least civil in Dutch, the working language of that place in that time.