A man in thought walking Unhappy with himself Unhappy with all the desperate Need he couldn’t combat Muttering the beginning of a poem He had read in frenzy, in a meaningless Reading binge, is stopped suddenly

By a blue black Siamese kitten – That old superstition about being crossed By a cat that he believes in, as he believes In ghosts and apparitions, stops him.

And then as suddenly he Finds the kitten running towards him And rubbing its silky sleek fur Over his ankles, his meowing Joins her meowing, becomes poetry And his bitter curled lips Break into the first unforced smile Of the day.