Sunday, November 13, 2011

Curiosity by Alastair Reid


may have killed the cat; more likely 
the cat was just unlucky, or else curious
 
to see what death was like, having no cause
 
to go on licking paws, or fathering
 
litter on litter of kittens, predictably.
Nevertheless, to be curious 
is dangerous enough. To distrust
 
what is always said, what seems,
 
to ask old questions, interfere in dreams,
 
leave home, smell rats, have hunches
 
do not endear cats to those doggy circles
 
where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches
 
are the order of things, and where prevails
 
much wagging of incurious heads and tails.
Face it. Curiosity 
will not cause us to die-
 
only lack of it will.
 
Never to want to see
 
the other side of the hill
 
or that improbable country
 
where living is an idyll
 
(although a probably hell)
 
would kill us all.
 
Only the curious
 
have, if they live, a tale
 
worth telling at all.
Dogs say cats love too much, are irresponsible, 
are changeable, marry too many wives,
 
desert their children, chill all dinner tables
 
with tales of their nine lives.
 
Well, they are lucky. Let them be
 
nine-lived and contradictory,
 
curious enough to change, prepared to pay
 
the cat price, which is to die
 
and die again and again,
 
each time with no less pain.
 
A cat minority of one
 
is all that can be counted on
 
to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell
 
on each return from hell
 
is this: that dying is what the living do,
 
that dying is what the loving do,
 
and that dead dogs are those who do not know
 
that dying is what, to live, each has to do.

                Inspiring. Is not that everyone praises in a person? The ability to look to the horizon and not only admire the beauty of it (any dog can do that) but also wonder what is beyond that, and take it to the next level. Many fall into the normalcy of the everyday, not taking any chances, and wondering why they feel so empty. Others, however, realize that there can be more, if they are willing to pay for it. But in the end it was worth it, because the vibrancy is what life is all about. This can be easily explained with Eli Wiesel’s quote “The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, its indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death.” Great variance gives life its meaning, while entropy only gives a general life represented by the color beige.
            From a stylistic point of view, I liked also the format by Mr. Reid, with an almost introduction, a verse in pseudo-paragraph form, a second differently styled verse,  then the last verse much like verse one and the intro combined. Also, the metaphors contrasting the cats and the dogs was clever too.

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