December #4

You Should So Ask For Help ...

You should so ask for help

that a wind will rise from the stones

and swirl around you, buoyant:

a soft cloak, a raft of air,

a sweet in-rush of breath.

You should so ask for help

that rain will fall gently, washing

all debris away from your path,

so you walk forth unobstructed

raising your face to be bathed.

You should so ask for help

that the grasses will ripple before you

like waves of an earth ocean,

as they flatten to ease your steps

and spring back straight behind.

You should so ask for help

that the sun and all the stars

brighten and flare at your call,

and people around you suddenly smile 

as you yourself are warmed.

First you must ask for help

to ask in such a way — must ask

for the long slow gifts 

of trust and patience,

humility, strength, integrity.

Or find the quicker way:

pray to be an instrument

of Love, Peace and Truth. 

Create with these a vision so large 

that all you are and do is in its service.

Whether you sleep or wake,

speak or be silent, scratch an itch,

make love, argue, go shopping ...

the vision is more than you; it holds you,

contains and fills you — that one!

Be prepared for your vision to take

if need be, lifetimes, and leagues of angels.

Seek to enrol the whole world

on to your team. Ask for help....

Take heart. You should so ask.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

December #3

Ask for Help!!
A song for those struggling with the concept of equality

(To the tune of I Can Help - by Billy Swan)

If you don't know what to do

if you don't know what to say

if the main thought in your head is 'please make it go away'

ask for help

there'll be someone who can change things

ask for help

It would do you good

to do the things you should

so ask for help.

 

If everything you're doing

seems to turn out wrong

try taking some deep breaths and remembering this song

and ask for help

there'll be someone who can fix things

ask for help

You don't know it all

nobody ever could

so ask for help

 

When you go to bed at night you want to be able to sleep

Treating people properly is something that will always keep

your conscience clear...

 

So instead of trying to hide that you don't know what to do

Instead of fooling yourself that you can muddle through

ask for help

from the people who know best

ask for help

be better than the rest

It would do the world good

if you do the things you should

so ask for help.

 

Michele Brenton 25th December 2014
Merry Christmas!!

December #2

That's Enough Tough

When you break into tears

at Denpasar Airport,

because the pain in your ear

is an octopus-invasion of throb,

you have crossed the line.

Men stare, assessing.

Women don't cry, not here,

not ever.

One man tries to steal your backpack,

for you have given permission

by being vulnerable.

The official you ask for help

wishes to put you out of sight,

for adults don't cry,

and you must expect this sort of thing

as a strong woman travelling.

The airport medical staff

tell you to stop,

because it's not that bad.

No hospital for you.

Get on the plane.

You will be fine.

In the privacy of the aeroplane toilet,

you sag, and flush away all tags attached to you.

With what's left, you cry again,

afraid and alone.

The toughest act of all

is to say “I hurt",

and it's a badge of courage

to ask for help.

— Helen Patrice

December #1

e.g this is enough

Apt.

Beautifully put.

Concise, convex.

Drama dominates.

Everything expires.

Futures fizzle.

Grandiose, giggly, grunting.

Heavy-handed.

Interesting.

Just judicial.

Kitchenware.

Lampooning, lightness, & lexicon.

Magic.

Never? Not now?

Obtuse, obviously.

Patience!  Purity! Passion! Performance?

Quietly querulous.

Rubbish! (Roundly)

Sensible, sound and snappy.

Terrorism.

Uprisings, unguents.

Visual & Vital Verbs.

When?

Xasperating …

You?

Zithering …

That is enough.

Tough.

— Jennie Fraine

November #4

Old Lady with Cat

While my body snores

at last, on these humid nights,

he, my black-haired darling,

prowls the cool outdoors.

Mornings he's nearly always

back, sharing my bed,

accepting an embrace

before requiring breakfast.

If I wake up still alone,

by the time I open the door

he's running up the front steps

calling a greeting.

We remember the others

who were here, whom we loved,

but now they are ghosts, and this

is the end time (may it be long)

when we, being finally only two,

are all-in-all to each other.

In age we learn the true things —
e.g. this is important, e.g. this is enough.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

November #3

To sleep: perchance to dream…

I never know what to expect

each night I go to bed;

the ravelled sleeve of care stays ravelled,

tattered and in shreds.

In fact the action packed

into the theatre of my dreams

frays the fabric of my mind

and soundtracks it with screams.

I've swooped and soared above the clouds

and plummeted to earth,

borne immolation many times

relived countless births

from the point of view of mother

and from that of child,

I've even mothered fox cubs

then released them in the wild.

I've wondered where my husband is

while marrying another,

had long chats with dead relatives,

rowed furiously with Mother;

grieved for people still alive,

partied with the feted,

was once hailed saviour of the world

and simultaneously hated.

The only common factor is

my dreams are never bores;

I'm continuously fascinated

while my body snores.

— Michele Brenton

November #2

The World They've Created Comes To A Full Stop

The day my daughter saw

that I did not know what might live

inside a basketball,

and my impatient reply

of 'I don't know, maybe fairies'

sealed my fate.

I was no longer her goddess,

and she turned to the outside world

to see who might ascend the throne.

Friends' mothers, her grandmother, teachers

all failing that steep set of steps

sooner or later,

so Britney Spears and the Spice Girls

adorned her bedroom walls,

and she chanted nightly:

'Oops, I did it again'

while my bath water reverberated in time

to their backbeat songs.

I was never again offered the throne or sceptre,

but deity light shone upon me briefly,

when she had her first baby,

and I was the only one
who could rock him to sleep.

— Helen Patrice

November #1

Or Any Other Kind Of Pen: a Romance

One word lingers over a blank page

ephemeral, almost transparent, fading

as it wafts away uncaptured.

A second word strays in its wake

vanishes beyond thought, distracted

by a fascination.

There is a mild stir. 

A sentence appears.

For how long? And what was the crime? 

Dragging itself out into the open,

dangling voice and story in front of a jury?

Off the page with you!

Don’t even think of it!

Out!

But: mightier than the sword, a pen 

strides into view, leaps to hand, brandishes

ballpoint, strikes a blow for freedom and

in one frenzied dash crashes across paper

leaving a stream of consciousness

full of mixed metaphors

and darlings needing

to be murdered.

Words tremble as the world they’ve created

comes to a full stop.

— Jennie Fraine

October #4

Diagrams in Felt-Tipped Pen

Or in pencil. Or biro.

Sometimes even fountain-pen —

we used them then, and my parents

gave me a slim one for my twelfth birthday.

The felt tips, of course, came quite a lot later.

But I never lost the habit,

starting in school exercise books.

'You're a great old doodler, aren't you?'

one English teacher said — but tolerantly.

I was always top of the class in English, after all.

It was an aid to thinking.

Don't ask me how that could be;

I only know it worked for me. Between

taking notes, I filled the corners of the pages

with close, elaborate, complex, abstract shapes.

Nothing recognisable —

not at all realist, nor naturalist.

It was all geometric: endless variations

of triangles, rectangles, diamonds, squares,

tempered by circles and coils, arcs and undulations.

After creating the outline

I might then decide on sections

to fill in solid, painstakingly making

new patterns in the old traditional shapes.

Each pattern piece was tiny; the whole, intricate.

When Rorschach tests became

the latest whizz-bang thing, back in

the seventies, some of my (ahem!) friends

wondered aloud what my doodles might reveal

and made rude, amused speculations, with guffaws.

By then, I was doodling upon

telephone message pads, train tickets,

restaurant menus, as well as my own journals

and the edges of any letters I still wrote by hand —

the ones to elderly relatives, who still thought that polite.

Those who knew me well

came to accept this eccentricity.

They seldom even remarked on it any more.

I decided it had to do with the pattern-making urge

and therefore, I supposed, not inappropriate for a poet.

Then the whole world changed.

Now I write emails on computer, make poems

on my iPad, jot down the shopping lists on my phone.

We text each other details we need to remember. No place

for proliferating diagrams in felt-tipped or any other kind of pen.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

October #3

To My Mitochondria

I remember painstaking lines and

careful colouring-in 

punctuated by leaning back

in blissful satisfaction to 

admire the result.

I learned their biochemistry

and their physiology

gazed at slides

from microtomes.

I once knew such a lot of things

and now that knowledge

is long gone.

All I can recall from then - 

diagrams in felt-tipped pen.

Michele Brenton

October #2

The Past Tells Me I Exist

Those genes I sowed years ago

on hard ground

raised dragons of fire and water

who roar at the world

in ways I never could.

They spliced themselves,

and now here come the results,

helixing down the hallway

to scramble onto my morning bed

and feed me cold toast.

They shiver like cells around me

with toy trucks and jam,

insisting on under-the-blanket tents.

Meditation detaches me from the world,

and these two hot, moist little junior dracos

bring me back to it.

They make me live hard
right down to my mitochondria.

— Helen Patrice

October #1

Memories to Gather Later

As if the Past truly exists.

For Auld Lang Syne.

What’s done and said

Arms. Linked. Singing.

The songs of sirens.

Long fruitless journeys.

Shipwrecks. Survivals.

On the rocks. Let’s drink!

To that, and take a break.

There’s no tomorrow

Literally. The future?

Also non-existent.

Trapped here, now.

What? This moment?

This? And this? This

Endlessness of Now?

No! Conjure: artful enemies.

Betrayals. Caesarean.

Lies and tragedies.

My own one-Act plays.

Banish meaninglessness.

Watch commercial TV.

Old episodes and new ads.

All images spark memory.

Spirit of Tasmania.

Access to adventure.

State of beauty. Remember.

Sick trips with two kids.

Retirement. Caravan. Sunset.

Son’s birthday lego pirate ship.

A plank across the towbar.

Blindfolded, walking forward.

Gather friends who teach.

Encourage my reaching.

Voices entertain. Enrich.

Only the Past tells me

“I” exist.

— Jennie Fraine

September #4

They Try Again

They try again
to recollect the flavour
of what was,
hunting through trophies
only they can find:
the personal phrases,
the unimportant
yet cherished habits —

but it's thundery cold outside
and they who hide within
are only two now,
who must make new tales
to warm themselves, other
memories to gather later.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

September #3

Harder the second time around

I never thought I'd be excited
to see a divorce
or encourage one so gleefully
and enjoy each severance
witnessed in pixel-dancing light.

Something rises in me, a tidal wave
wanting more and more
until the old is swept away
and change becomes the new
landscape.

I used to shout at the television
when I was young and watching films:
Walk away or sneak away at night
when they are asleep. Get away while
you can!

Too many celluloid sacrifices,
too many individuals subsumed
for the sake of the storyline.

This is real life and the stories
can be better or worse.
I sit through this night
on the edge of my seat.
Please let this be the happy beginning,
the day when it didn't take
death to us part.
Because if there isn't a clean getaway
we all know what happens

when they try again.

— Michele Brenton 

September #2

Create Speak Surrender

Create the space

in the heart

for an incoming love.

Speak the words

that cement it all

in a small diamond ring.

Surrender to the machine

that is wedding and family

and the dress, above all.

Create the space

in the body

for an embryo.

Speak the idea

into silence

and mother's disapproval.

Surrender to the machine

that is pregnancy, baby,

and the pedestal of  motherhood.

Create the space

in the marriage

for two babies, and a breakdown.

Speak the words

that all is ill, broken,

the truth of neglect.

Surrender to the machine

that is divorce, aloneness,

and a sheaf of bills.

Twenty years later,

and the hard work,

the break, the regrowth

is done.

Creation is poetry.

Speaking is unnecessary.

Surrendering is time with grandchildren.

Making love is both easier

and harder,
the second time around.

— Helen Patrice

September #1

All That Terror (grin) Provides the Thrill

And the worst of it

is standing there

knowing you all need to know

that I know you, care.

Larynx glued, immobilised,

breath choking off the apt word—

words big enough to leap

the chasm between us

have tumbled, their syllables

echoing long after

we break eye contact.

This is La Grande Peur

more masterful than Death,

binding lips, sealing off

all possibility of love

for all fifty of you, myself.

This paralysis cannot be

permanent. I must lose

my self now, take that step:

create, speak, surrender.

— Jennie Fraine

August #4

It Only Needs to Win Once — You Think? 

Courage, you think,

only needs to win once.

After that you can relax,

never fear again,

be always brave and daring,

confident like others —

the everyone else

who, you're always being told,

aren't scared.

But it doesn't work like that.

Courage is needy, wanting 

your full attention,

refusing to be taken for granted.

It wants to own you;

catching you with your pants down,

wants to give you a thrill — the biggest.

Courage is a very

demanding lover.

Or else it's a wilful child

that runs away.

You have to chase after it,

find it, bring it home,

settle it — embrace it

all over again.

Every time.

Too bad if you tire 

of the game.

You think you only need

to win once,

but it's not enough.

Each time is new —

new effort, journey, struggle, 

catch of breath.

But then, it's all that terror

(grin) 

provides the thrill.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

August #3

Living through the pain

My compatriot urged his dad

to rage against the dying of the light

but my rage is against pain

and blood and tears and sweat

and hope getting stomped

when it peeps its little

chocolate-buttony bright eyes

over the top of the trench

where it very wisely hid

until optimism once more

triumphed over experience.

I watch you living through the pain

and I try to find something positive

in your brave, dogged fight

and I love you for your strength,

your weakness, your quirks,

your failings, your heart

but I cannot find anything positive

that wasn't already a part of you

before the adversary arrived

and this torment began.

I want to scoop you up

in my arms and hold you

until the danger passes

but you see it never does.

That bloody enemy stalks

us all the time and never sleeps

and even if I doze with one eye

open it still sneaks in because

nobody can win against it every time

and it only needs to win once.

— Michele Brenton

August #2

Firm Body Upright

for Amanda Watson and Dani Cooper 

She pounds her gravity-bound knees,

with hands still free.

Her wheelchair, black and silver,

gleams solid in the stage light.

Rising behind her, dark dancer,

jerking the movements she cannot express.

Dancer sinews hip lift to shoulder roll,

as the music clanks on.

"My body is a cage".

The seated one is veiled in black,

legs seen and still,

face hidden.

The dancer does all the woman cannot:

not enough for either

to have only six minutes

of shining to others.

Her body is upright in her chair,

as the dancer leaves the stage.

She is firm, still whole and uninvaded
by surgeon or the harder-core drugs.

Her resolve is to keep living
through the pain.

— Helen Patrice

August #1

Knowing it is right

makes it

legitimate

if it fits

wear it

also sets

you up

for a fight

some call that

civilised debate

the thing is

it pulls you

off centre

you have to

grab hold

to regain

balance

anything

will do as

long as

you get

through,

both feet

firm, body

up right

— Jennie Fraine

July #4

Easy, Do What's Right
A Dedication

I walk in procession

by candlelight, 

cloaked in white 

for my pure intention. 

We form a circle. 

I make affirmation

claiming myself as Goddess,

Daughter of the Divine.

The two women presiding

gently remove the white, 

enfold me

in my own rich magenta.

Earlier, my magenta cloak

lay stretched across the altar

between the candelabra

and the ceremonial sword.

Alone in the temple

I, who in my long life

bent the knee to none,

was moved to kneel to the Goddess.

Private vows; public avowal.

Afterwards all the women dance,

and I with them,

in our cloaks of light.

I am wrapped

in the peace of the Goddess,

embraced by the warmth

of my sisters.

I walk forward

into this new, late stage of life

and find it easy,
knowing it is right.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

July #3

Activation

Like a pill

grim and white

I must take,

good for me,

so they say,

take the nasty

dreams away!

I swallow

so much dreck

from high-ups

smiling wide

wearing suits

planting seeds

poison fruits.

Then WAKE UP!

Smell the beans

recognise

what it means

to be snowed

be kowtowed

be reduced,

zeroed, cowed.

Stand up, stretch

look around

take it in

what is there,

not the show

see what’s wrong

make it fair.

Spit the pill

grim and white

stuff what’s easy

do what’s right.

— Michele Brenton

July #2

To Leave, To Love, To Make

To Leave

The heat leeches from my dry skin

as soon as I abandon the hearthside.

The house sleeps behind me,

and in my seven layers I go

into winter's night under new Moon.

Seven shades past black to true dark.

With finger whitened to bone, I cast circle,

shivering inside.

The earth plane drops away.

I am between the worlds.

To Love

To love the world so much

that magic must be done

close to equinox

when the Moon is yet to swell with possibility,

and the world teeters between death and life.

To love the world enough

to hold seven veils of chiffon

and have them fall, one, two, three,

through the chant

for the dropping of illusion,

truth to be revealed,

for honesty and love to show through.

Seven veils for the seven gates

of Inanna.

To love the world so much

that corruption is willed away,

and lies in government

grow thin as chiffon.

A chant, a mantra for each veil,

a gateway into light.

To Make

In the last minutes of the new Moon,

before She begins to birth herself,

with the power of seven elements – 

air, water, fire, earth, metal, spirit, mind – 

I feel in my cupped hands

the idea of how the world could be,

and it sings one united clean song.

I feed in energy, through the top of my head,

down my body, out my hands,

strengthening, enlarging the vision.

I let it go to embrace the world.

The spell is done.

Circle is open, unbroken.
The hearth welcomes me as a pilgrim.

— Helen Patrice

July #1

Does this mean I’m ready to wake?

Was there an earthquake?

A tremor, even?

A slight jolt?

Is my body in revolt?

Will this darkness last forever?

Oh, get a cup of tea, give me a break!

Relaxation music – imagine a lake:

its beauty, not the depths,

keep breathing!

Ah, stillness,

empty mind, not mind-full,

call upon the Dreamtime, the snake.

How many planetary rotations will it take?

Revolutions? Rebellions?

Interrupted sleeps?

Laughters and weeps?

At least I know I’m alive, tossing.

Until the bed becomes something

to leave, to love, to make.

— Jennie Fraine

June #4

Round and Round and Round and Round …

And round we go again,

spinning again on this pretty planet

as if the intricate dance 

were forever, its patterns important.

The moment seems to matter.

My cats are old and sick, my man is dead.

Tell me that’s not important.

Important to me — but not to some stranger

across the world, not to

animals in zoos or jungles, not at all

to insects living their little lives

and not to the stars in space, nor the space.

My friend is sad for her old mother

finally dead in her nineties: wondering, “Did I do 

enough?” (She did. I was witness.)

All these small human dramas we all repeat,

caught in the cycle. As if brand new

as we each meet each one as if for the first time.

Yet when we sink to restful emptiness,

how well we know that music, that old refrain.

It wells up to remind us, nothing 

is new, nothing is really unknown, nothing 

is individual. We spin our lives

again and again on our spinning planet.

Round and round and round and round 

we go again — caught in the spin, dreaming 

our little dramas as if they were real, 

as if we were here, as if we were now, as if….

(Lately I dream that I dream.

Does this mean I’m ready to wake?)

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

("Round and round and round and round we go again" — I'm not plagiarising, just alluding!)

June #3

Feedback Loop

The greatest mystery

is mysterious

and great.

In fact not just great

it is the GREATEST

and all the not-so-great mysteries

weep into cushions

while chowing down on an entire tub of

the most fattening ice cream

to quell their sense of inadequacy.

And the most fattening ice cream

which is creamy and icy

and fattening

is not just fattening

it is the MOST fattening

and for some reason also

the MOST delicious and moreish

and the MOST bad for you

which is often the way for food.

Why when we know this do we still…?

It is the greatest mystery.

It is mysterious

and great.

In fact not just great

it is the GREATEST

and round we go again…

— Michele Brenton

June #2

Falling Headlong: Autism

the years of curious reading
The Small Outsider

for pleasure and titillation;

to thank the gods it's nothing

to do with me,

this withdrawing from the world,

this other place within a person

that translates into rocking and spinning,

creature shrieks in the night – 

they were comforting

because I was safe.

the one word spoken

by Someone Who Knew

confirmed my every secret fear

and we were tossed down

a specific measured rabbit hole

to a desolate dune landscape

of broken grey quarries

and old entombed cities.

the one-way gate
to the greatest mystery.

— Helen Patrice

June #1

Muscle and Bone Subside

Here. Let me help you.

I struggle to lift the chair.

We move side table too.

Now you can swing

where once you would swivel.

Now it’s only your eyes turning

to watch the birds, the seasons

the garden tossing or still

its feet unmoving. You miss

the dancing.

You sink and settle. The chair

cuddles you; its many cushions

enclose muscle and bone.

Desire, too, subsides.

And faith in a better future.

There are many you scorn

who sink to a lower level –

The men. The budget makers.

The wealthy liars and cheats.

Whilst you might have become

less active, I wouldn’t call

your disgust with the TV news

less violent, your heart quiet.

In fact, despite the chair’s

security, I see you believe

we are all cast down, falling

headlong.

— Jennie Fraine

May #4

Suits Her Just Fine

Pleasure is now

a mug of cocoa, 

an Anzac biscuit

and a fine book to read.

Well, it always was —

but she remembers too

shopping at night in Kathmandu,

or meeting that shaman in Cusco.

She remembers lovers, 

their beautiful faces

and questing minds,

including the three she married.

And oh, she remembers loss,

hands that she held

as their owners died ...

the emptiness of dead bodies.

Now her elderly cat

comes every night

to lie beside her

on the wide bed.

The bed is warm.

The cat purrs.

Pain in muscle and bone

subsides.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

May #3

Moonlight becomes her

The worst of alien overlords

twirls her moustache

and smiles lopsidedly.

It took many years to

perfect that smile,

without it no archenemy could ever

hold their head high.

The moustache arrived with no effort at all

the only tricky part was

deciding to embrace it rather

than depilate. 

There are more

satisfying targets in life

and snide looks make it easier

when culling is required.

Whatever set her on this path to begin with,

she is happy now at the top of the tower,

finger on the button, deciding the game.

Heroines are for fairy tales and stories,

nothing to do with real life

and that suits her just fine.

— Michele Brenton

May #2

Furnace of the Sun

His scream blasts off

from the front garden launch pad,

as sudden as 'Challenger'.

It rises through the atmosphere,

busting its burners against gravity,

to break free of Earth's embrace,

and head for the furnace of the Sun,

where its heat belongs.

The outrage of not being allowed

to run on the road

in brand new winter shoes

that clomp like astronaut boots!

His eyes glitter with tears as bright as stars,

as Granny turns from best friend
to the worst of alien overlords.

— Helen Patrice

May #1

When we go deep

I will change we to they.

Let the young and agile

do that caving thing

squeezing through

narrow clumps of rock

interring themselves in

the dark recesses

of my imagination.

I just have to shudder.

Then there are the divers.

At first writhing like fish,

later holding a spear

ahead of the face while

beginning to morph

into shark and octopus.

Heavier, dropping into

denser currents, hot water.

I take quick deep breaths.

There’s just too many depths

available on this planet.

You have to be truly committed

to plumb them, feel the fear,

act anyway, free-falling, sinking.

There is so much other pleasure

in skimming surfaces, dancing

like a dragonfly between

leaves, over river water.

Is my aversion past-driven?

Too many storms at sea,

midnight runs at gunpoint,

surgery, anaesthetised?

Luckily, memory is like

a skating rink: such grace

on thick ice! strung between

that frozen surface and

the furnace of the sun.

— Jennie Fraine

April #4

Lifting the Lid

The things we find when we go deep

can be mysterious, like dreams.

Descending the abyss of sleep,

we find not all is what it seems.

For dreams use symbols, and distort

the things we find when we go deep.

Decoding leaves us overwrought,

unsure if we should laugh or weep.

Yet, if we take a wakeful peep

below the lid of consciousness,

the things we find when we go deep

may still be anybody's guess.

Myself, I'd rather meditate 

(the path of therapy being too steep)

and in that peace to contemplate

the joy I find when things go deep.

— Rosemary Nissen-Wade

April #3

Edgy

Toast crusts, pork scratchings,

burnt bits of meat,

borders of gardens,

bushes trimmed neat,

beaches and cliff tops

where nesting birds wedge,

some of these things can be found on the edge.

Lace upon lingerie, good for a thrill,

spun sugar topping Chantilly cream hills,

butterfly stroke for surface swimming,

makeup and fake tans on plastic-faced women,

suited blokes smiling with hard cold eyes,

coral reefs dying where golden sands lie.

For things of importance

the things we should keep,

those are the things we find when we go deep.

— Michele Brenton

April #2

Landscape for Clues

after reading Marge Piercy's 'The Cat's Song'

The cat will not speak her troubles,

but hides with them in the back yard ferns,

her eyes suddenly duller than autumn leaves.

Her white chest fur is dirty,

her backbone a line of mountains,

sharp as the Andes.

The cat does not speak her illness.

Her instinct is to shelter and die.

Her body is a landscape

to be felt for clues.

Medicine drags her back to life,

too slow, much too slow.

The cat sits on the bed,
close to the edge.

— Helen Patrice

(Tilly did come back to full health from pancreatitis. At the time of editing, she is our largest cat, very healthy, very stupid, and her hobby is hallucinating that the fence moves.)