Short Cat Story.

Short Cat Story

by james bezerra

Cat: wants to go outside.

Me: let’s cat outside.

Cat: realizes it's cold outside, looks at me like somehow I’m an asshole.

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All the Cats.

All the Cats

by james bezerra

It seems like there should be something said here about all the cats.

Because there have always been all the cats.

I like them,

I always do,

what with all their thoughtless selfishness

and finite love;

their claws

and wet eyes like dumb little gods,

but truth be told

every cat happened

because someone I loved

batted her eyes at me.

Said, “let’s get a(nother) cat.”

And every single time,

once she is gone –

because ultimately

she always ends up gone –

she never takes the cat.

There have been many cats,

but there has only ever been

this one story of the cats.

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Kafka's Cats.

You know, the memoirs of famous writers have been mysteriously silent on how to deal with the fact that a cat is constantly crossing back and forth in front of the writing and waiving its ass in your face while you're trying to come up with both sides of a really  good metaphor.

All writing about writing needs to deal with how to deal with cat asses in one’s face. HASHTAG truism.

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Good Stuff.

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Cats Don’t Care What Helicopters Are.

Cats Don’t Care What Helicopters Are

by james bezerra

Sometimes I feel bad for the cat

because life is hard enough when you know

that noise is a helicopter, a siren, a gunshot

or that it’s only my foot

moving under the blanket.

Life is hard enough

even when you know all that,

but for her it’s just a

massive loud thwumping overhead,

a shrieking wail,

a thunderous sudden popping,

or a nefarious creature

lurking below the blanket.

Sometimes though,

maybe she feels bad for me and

how worried I get about things which aren’t

food, sleep or food or sleep.

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Excerpts from Lydia Davis.

One of my classes recently introduced me to an author named Lydia Davis. She primarily writes very short short stories (Some as short as a sentence). That isn’t what’s astounding about her though. What’s astounding about her is how good she is with language. She bends it like a mystic bends a spoon. Below are some of my favorite twisted utensils from her collected works.   

On love and loss and sex and such:

… you’re planning it all, not in your head, really, somewhere inside your body, or all through your body, it’s all mounting up and coming together so that when you get in bed you can’t help it …

It isn’t over when it ends.

… she didn’t have to feel this was a burden, the fact that I loved her.

You can’t measure it, because the pain comes after and it lasts longer. So the question really is, Why doesn’t that pain make you say, I won’t do it again? When the pain is so bad that you have to say that, but you don’t.

And, everyone knows, to tolerate a person telling you about his childhood it is necessary to be in love with him.

On cockroaches:

We feel for such nimble rascals, such quick movers, such clever thieves.

It is in his moment of hesitation that you sense him as an intelligent creature. Between his pause and his change of direction, you are sure, there is a quick thought.

On cats:

… they could wait for a person longer than a person would wait for them.

… at each moment in its life, a cat has only one concern.

On the Napoleon Complex:

Small men are often inclined to take pride in their good health.

On waiting for a woman to show up:

… and the more women pass who resemble her, or the more they resemble her, the closer I think she is, and the more likely to appear.

If she does not come it would be wrong to say I will miss her, because she is always so present in my imagination.

On minimalism:

Her austerity sometimes borders on masochism.

On Women’s Lib:

… where henceforth will be the so-called superiority of the male man? In truth, I tell you: the time is close when women will become human beings.

This is the entire story (or is it a poem?) called The Fly:

At the back of the bus,

inside the bathroom,

this very small illegal passenger,

on its way to Boston.

And this is one of my favorites of hers. It has been stuck to my brain like napalm on skin since I read it a week ago. This is the entire story:

Information from the North Concerning the Ice

Each seal uses many blowholes and each blowhole is used by many seals.


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Two Kinds.

I’m sorry for posting this. There are enough pictures of cats out there already. Some people might ask, “Can there really ever be enough pictures of cats?” and the world might respond, “Yes.”

But this one is funnier than most of them, I think.

Pictures!

Through absolutely no effort of my own I recently came into possession of an Olympus E-500 digital SLR (thanks Rob!) and I recently spent a weekend playing with it around my apartment and trying to figure out how the hell all of the buttons and dials work. I once dated a very talented photographer and so I have some very very very minimal understanding of these things.


Of the seven hundred thousand pics I took that weekend, below are the only ones worthy of posting. I promise that I will get better at this.

A flower thing.Because I'm a girl.

Some wood we have sitting around. What? You don't have wood sitting around?

A non-epic shot of the TV displaying an epic shot of ... something.

My wall of writing notes.

My plant Fred.

A totally meta photo of a book about hotos. I mean photos.

Lilith the cat. Do not be fooled, she is awful.

A rare decent picture of The Kitten. Don't be fooled, she is awful.

A rare photo of your author. Don't be fooled, he is awful.

Felt which hangs in my hallway.

Naked. Juice.

cattail.

From left to right: My grandmother's old lingerie chest, one of those warped mirrors from Target that makes me look skinny, a drawing by my charming and delightful friend, a bookcase.

 
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