GREGORY O’BRIEN
Fate of a cat
What became of the cat that was always rubbing
up against your leg? Whenever I came around, it was
always the same. Always rubbing. Always
your leg. The same leg. But one day the cat was
gone. And when I mentioned this you cited the
first law of thermodynamics then added, matter-
of-factly, that it was only a matter of time, with
that amount of friction — with that loss and gain of
heat — the cat had rubbed itself out…… Now
I find the missing cat’s face in the most unlikely
places. It has become a footprint left in clay, the sole
of an old shoe, a leaf that has blown from a garden
fire or that comes to us from some outer province of
autumn. I see the cat’s face in mud-
pool and mirror, puddle and milk bowl. Through
its eyes I can see forever.
Whangarei head, 1981
Ancient
as I am,
fired and forged
moon-faced
or freshly
formed —
a lost cat
lingers, her head
an outcrop or
island
a brick
almost or
paving stone. Once
I had a cat
the shape
of Northland —
rough-cast, thrown,
a reminder that the outer edge
of anything is all
we ever see.
Face adrift
above its mineral
body, or supping from
an earthen bowl
in kiln-light
its sideways
glance became
a scarred, inconsolable
face, and its face
an imprint
of foot
or paw. Together
we sought the company
of smoke-like things,
of rust
and rustling,
Yvonne of the well-
calibrated furnace, her
fired-up world
from which
arose this
circus of
hollowed eyes, music
of fingerprinted ears —
this allotment
of earth
and the one
perfect afternoon of a
lamentable year
given us.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gregory O’Brien was the 2015 Stout Memorial Fellow at Victoria University. These poems were inspired by a ceramic work made by Tony Fomision and included in the exhibition ‘Empire of Dirt’ (curated by Doris De Pont) at Objectspace, Auckland, in November/December 2015.