I sat on the stairway
Reading “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”,
When a queer sound rustled at my feet.
She sniffed my right green slipper,
Then tickled the other with her dark muzzle.
I stared down at her, surprised,
And she stared back at me with vivid yellow orbs.
The creature climbed up the steps and danced around me.
So mysterious is she, this black sphinx,
And beautiful.
Every inch of her nimble body is perfect to the eye.
Her mouth is silver.
Her teeth are stars.
The dainty paws resemble ancient fossilized leaves.
She is silent, silent as the night stealing the evening.
She knows the way of the world.
But here, in the shelter of humans,
The cruel talons of Earth will never touch her,
So she is too smart to abide by it.
To her, I am not stranger, but a curiosity that may give her food.
Her legs tense and she leaps magnificently high for her size,
And then she is gone.
The creature was a mirage, a dream.
Her ebony fur was more magical than the Hair of a drowned Myriad.
Her sleek flanks were the stuff of legends.
Her tail is the tail of a black leopard.
Her nose was a pebble lying in the deepest lake in the world.
I call, “Midnight!” but the cat was gone.
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