Some liquid cat
slick along the edges
doesn’t sharply define itself.
It hides its knife.
Pick it up unexpectedly
it may admire
your face with a swipe
give you future scars to suture.
If you grimace or cry out
it may bite you thousandfold
with machine-gun perforations
red tattoos inscribed by Satan
leave you coughing on the folly
of loving cats or allowing them
their unrestricted due. Or food.
But then, alas, it slinks along you.
