Starving Pet

Often in the middle of a dream, I suddenly remember to feed it, though years have passed since the last time I did. So that now I find it barely alive -just the shadow of a bird shivering on its perch, or the skeleton of a cat hissing in the cupboard. Sometimes they look reproachful. Sometimes they try to bite. And what on earth keeps them alive except resentment towards me?

Times like that I feel like a nan who has married two or three women in separate states, but forgotten each one. Not out of malice. It's just his nature to be easily distracted. And sometimes the starving pet is human an infant in a shoe box I've forgotten I have.

Sometimes I think it's the soulI must be neglecting. Sometimes the body. Sometimes the mother in me. Sometimes the child. But they are all so demanding the dog I never owned, the baby I never had aways calling out and looking for attention. Even now, I guarantee, one of them is asking for something which I, no doubt, have agreed to, though already I can't quite recall what it is.