Madonna Lionessa (Part Ii)

ii. And the glands beside your heart Some secret of evolution they couldn't understand So they never troubled themselves to puzzle Out why you, their sphinx, remained silent Now begin to purr. It frightens you. You had purred after they scratched your proud head And petted your belly after you had been collared, The jingling of the bells firstly sounding delightful Until they became the tolling mournful keening of The jester's hat, Lear's Fool, sitting sadly at the Stage Door Canteen in a new costume, Half-drunk on weak yet cheap well scotch, Waiting for the sound of the buzzer To go on as Cordelia, another cat at the end of her rope Who forfeited a crown, was hunted down, soon to dance To the satisfied grunts and faux horror of the groundlings. And now you purr against your will as you Look at your new owner; you had been Discarded, abandoned, dumped, A sad case, this cat, Who would no longer hunt But lay in the grass motionless While mouse and chipmunk and songbird Who once feared her now jeer her On their way to larder and nest; She did not care and was cast behind Prison bars among contemptible cats Driven reasonless by indifference Which was never the source of your problem. He approaches you at the shelter now; He has friendly eyes and a soothing voice But he approaches you with an encompassing hand You can imagine around your neck Like a constricting steel collar -- You won't be garroted again. You hiss, rear back, ready to strike, would strike now But for the confusing cacophony inside your pricked ears from The audible purring beating seducing quickening inside your breast. Can you ever be free of him?