Catherine Pierce is the author of Animals of Habit (Kent State University Press, 2004), a winner of the Wick Chapbook Competition. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Slate, Gulf Coast, Mid-American Review, Barrow Street, Third Coast, Blackbird, and elsewhere. She holds an M.F.A. from the Ohio State University and a Ph.D. from the University of Missouri. In the fall, she will join the English faculty at Mississippi State University.
Instinct
I woke to screaming. Outside, a raccoon
was opening a cat. The cat shrieked like a child
as red ropes spooled from its belly.
There was nothing to do; it couldn’t
be saved, was already beginning
to shudder. After another minute,
it was still, its entrails steaming
in the crisp air. The raccoon
waddled away, uninterested.
This is a love poem.
It isn’t about the cat or the raccoon.
It's about you, still asleep, breathing
evenly and guiltless, and me, awake
and fascinated. What do you see, sleeping?
Empty hallways, maybe, or broken
bottles, or gardens of flesh blooming
around bullets. You could pull
so many triggers behind your eyes. Or maybe
just a woman, tall, with thin wrists. How easily
I could leave you, slip on my coat and shoes
while you dream of what I can't know. So simple
to kill what we don't understand. But instead
we allow it. We sleep next to each other,
roll over at three a.m. and startle
at the weight that balances our bed. We could
spend a lifetime circling, sniffing each other out,
and then turn to meet a dark, clawed creature
we've never seen but know like we know
our bones. Nothing can alter our course. We are animals
of habit. We shut our bodies down together,
wake each morning gutted and hungry.
There was nothing to do; it couldn’t
be saved, was already beginning
to shudder. After another minute,
it was still, its entrails steaming
in the crisp air. The raccoon
waddled away, uninterested.
This is a love poem.
It isn’t about the cat or the raccoon.
It's about you, still asleep, breathing
evenly and guiltless, and me, awake
and fascinated. What do you see, sleeping?
Empty hallways, maybe, or broken
bottles, or gardens of flesh blooming
around bullets. You could pull
so many triggers behind your eyes. Or maybe
just a woman, tall, with thin wrists. How easily
I could leave you, slip on my coat and shoes
while you dream of what I can't know. So simple
to kill what we don't understand. But instead
we allow it. We sleep next to each other,
roll over at three a.m. and startle
at the weight that balances our bed. We could
spend a lifetime circling, sniffing each other out,
and then turn to meet a dark, clawed creature
we've never seen but know like we know
our bones. Nothing can alter our course. We are animals
of habit. We shut our bodies down together,
wake each morning gutted and hungry.
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