When I was five I wanted to be a cat.
So I could reach the sun and climb the apple trees.
When I was ten I wanted to be a ninja.
So I could leap from rooftops and defeat evil.
Looking back I just wanted a katana.
A samurai might have been better.
When I was fifteen I wanted to be an animal biologist.
So I could learn to speak cat and create ninja felines.
When I was twenty I wanted to be free.
So I could just stop failing math because I could never count.
I dreamed.
So I went to the local shelter and got a cat.
Who napped in the sun and climbed the garden shed out back.
Who leaped from rooftop to rooftop, up and down my street
and once, gave the German shepherd Mr. Norris owns, a scratch.
Who taught me to speak cat and that, if you think your cat meowed
in agreement. They meowed in agreement.
Who lived the longest a cat ever could. Free always, because I believed so.
If I believe a cat free. Cannot I believe in me.
Let me defy gravity like my ninja cat. Just once.
Tomorrow. I just might be your cat.
