"Momentary Miracle" by Laurinda Lind

Momentary Miracle

My friend Frank kept
a death watch on his cat
and on his marriage while
he was at it, one due
to frequent strokes,
the other since his wife
had already moved
her boyfriend in,
which struck him as
an important clue.
From the guesthouse
he saw his neighbor
shoveling in the yard
by a flagpole and went
out shirtless to ask
him what the shallow hole
was for, and the neighbor
said, My cat can't walk,

it's damn near dead.
Frank looked at his ankles
where something circled
and asked, Is that him
there? The cat was alive
on its legs but there was no
second coming at Frank’s
house, where needles
numbed the stricken
and the boyfriend moved
his son in, too, while Frank
dropped more weight
and even the neighbor’s
cat eventually got around
to going, and in the end
no resurrection seemed
real enough to fill all
the holes back in again.

Laurinda Lind

Laurinda Lind lives in New York’s North Country, near Canada. Some of her poems are in Atlanta Review, New American Writing, Paterson Literary Review, and Spillway. She is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee.

Headshot: Penny Heath (Heath Photography)

Photo Credit: Staff