My Uncle and the Neighbor's Cats

On back porch steps facing

the garden and an open field,

I’d sit next to him,

a lanky compilation of gruffness

and garrulousness, saying little

because you weren’t supposed to,

this was serious business, waiting

for the neighbor’s cats to jump

the fence. He was so fast and his aim

so sure that the rifle would catch

the cat in mid-leap before I knew

he’d pressed the trigger.

The neighbor, his son’s in-laws,

had lots of cats. My uncle, like

Robert Frost, believed in fences.

He didn’t believe in cats.

This is another poem in the series begun this week on growing up in the South, Suggested by Nancy Rosback at A Little Somethin’. Although she probably didn’t envision a poem quite like this one, which is entirely true.

Photograph: Cat Behind the Fence by Jiri Hodan via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.