Moment Of Absorbtion

The waxing moon looks bright and clean in the blue sky, washed by yesterday's rain, gleaming coolly with the sunrise. Birds are holding conference. Many different voices start, stop, and overlap, a polyphonic concert to greet the day. Crows add their coarse calls, flapping from one tree to another. I look at the cat in my lap, stroking her chin, watching her turn her face towards the window to watch the crows come and go.

For a moment, I’m lost in our mutual enjoyment of the present. I forget myself completely, absorbed in cat watching birds, green eyes sparkling, gentle purring, soft white fur. Forgotten but not gone, my presence abides with her, observing from her feline vantage. I shift back into focus and find that the moon has slipped away, either vanished in the increasing light or lost as we spin away from her. The cat sighs when I speak affectionately to her. She understood me better in the silence. I did too.

The crows continue their yelping in distant trees. A young raptor swoops by. Peregrin Falcon? Red Tailed Hawk? American Kestrel? Cooper’s Hawk? There are many possibilities here. With such a brief glimpse, I can’t be sure. There and gone with a hush, this little assassin is as elusive as the moon, as ephemeral as my moment of absorption. A brush stroke of motion through space, erased by time.