Table of Contents
Title Page
Table of Contents
Copyright
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About the Author
Copyright © 2005 by Cynthia Rylant
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 215 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10003.
www.hmhco.com
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Rylant, Cynthia.
Boris/Cynthia Rylant.
p. cm.
1. Cats—Poetry. I. Title.
PS3568.Y55B67 2005
811’.54—dc22 2004021093
ISBN-13: 978-0-15-205412-0 ISBN-10: 0-15-205412-X
ISBN-13: 978-0-15-205809-8 pb ISBN-10: 0-15-205809-5 pb
eISBN 978-0-547-53769-6
v1.0115
1
They were smart
to put a storefront
humane shelter
on the street I walked.
I was new in town.
Everybody else was used
to those cats in cages
in the windows.
They kept on walking,
trained not to glance over,
lest they lie awake
at night thinking about
that long-haired tabby
waiting
waiting
waiting.
But I hadn’t been trained.
I tried not to look.
I have never been able
to go to a humane shelter.
But now
they had brought one to me.
I’d buried my last cat
two years before.
I had only dogs now.
Dogs that didn’t get into
howling, spitting fights
in the middle of the night.
Dogs that didn’t spray
or leave chunks of
frothy hair ball on the
carpet exactly where I
place my feet
in the morning.
I had buried my last cat.
I was a dog person now.
But they’d put a storefront
humane shelter
on the street I walked
every day.
And I was new in town.
I lasted two months.
Then I went inside,
swearing I’d get only one,
and only a girl,
and no more.
Working hard to keep
my heart together.
Cages, cages, eyes.
They can’t be too sad.
Cats sleep 80 percent
of the time.
They are all right,
could be worse.
Don’t look at that dog
over there.
The one storefront dog
in the cage.
You will break apart.
Ashamed of it.
But not made for shelters.
At first I thought,
I’ll choose this one,
this nervous one.
I’ll choose this one,
this old battered one.
I’ll choose this one,
this bright one.
Cages, cages, eyes.
And then last cage,
last cage,
there you were, Boris.
With your gray sister.
And you stood up
and stretched
and purred
and promised, promised
you would be good if
I took her, too,
because she had
kept you alive
all those days and days and days.
Three months in a cage,
Boris, with your sister,
living in the moment
with only your memories
of leaves and rooftops
and warm brown mice.
I promise, you said,
and I believed you,
and I took home
two cats—one more
than I wanted, and
a boy at that—
but you promised,
and I knew.
2
You spent the first week
hiding
under a down comforter
in the farthest room
at the back of my house
upstairs.
We’d step in softly
to visit you, Boris,
you and your sister.
And, slowly, out you’d come
with a stretch and a yawn.
Not ready for freedom
just yet.
One gets used to a cage,
whether he likes it
or not.
We held you both
on our laps
and spoke your names
as we stroked
your heads.
Near week’s end
we had a talk
with the dogs.
We told them
there were two cats
upstairs
they didn’t know about
who’d been
listening to all the barking.
We told them to be nice.
Then one of us went in
to sit with you
while the other let
the dogs in, quietly.
You were so fine, Boris.
Not a flinch.
They wagged and sniffed
and pressed closer
and just one little
flick of the ear
was all you gave away
of your alarm.
So fine.
A week later
you and your sister
were downstairs,
fighting for lap space
with the dachshund.
And when you swatted
that stubborn dog’s nose one day,
we knew
you were home.
3
There are eagles
where we live, Boris,
and maybe you don’t
know this,
but they have
been known to carry off cats.
I even heard
about one eagle
who carried off a dog.
Usually the eagle
overestimates his abilities,
and he drops the dog
or the cat
before he ever gets it back
to the wife and kids
in the nest.
Still, that drop
has got to hurt.
I read about
one cat in a cast
for months.
So listen, Boris,
though I love those eagles,
love them,
you must assume
they are all out to get you,
and you must never,
as I often do,
stand on a beach
beneath them
and say,
“Oh, how beautiful!”
&nb
sp; Because one of
them is
at that very moment
measuring you
from head to tail,
pulling out his
calculator and
converting inches into
pounds
and assessing
just what velocity
he’d have to be traveling
to sweep you
off your feet
and have you
over for dinner.
As dinner.
I am hoping, Boris,
that the fish
those eagles
pluck from the water
every morning for breakfast
will never run out,
because if they do,
we are going to
have to feed you nothing but
milk shakes and butter
until we are rolling you
down the beach
every day
and telling those birds
you are just
not
worth the trouble.
4
The rains are starting, Boris,
and we are seeing
much more of you.
There at the door with
your sad, wet cry.
Missing the warm stove
in the garden room
where your sister lies
curled, blissfully
unaware of your absence.
We all need to
come home sometime.
May as well time it
with the winter rain.
For in summer who cares.
We care nothing for
the soft, velvety chair
alongside the reading lamp.
Nothing for the warm
down pillows
on our beds.
The hot showers.
The thick robes.
The cocoa.
In summer we love
less our faithful houses
and pledge our allegiance
to willow trees
and hammocks
and full night moons.
Poor houses.
Waiting patiently
till we finally
appreciate the
roofs that don’t leak,
the doors that don’t squeak,
and the furnace
that works.
We are like you, Boris.
We are outside cats
and proud of it
until the first big drop
of rain hits our noses
and we run for the door,
leaving our free spirits
behind us,
crawling into someone’s lap.
5
They were guessing at the shelter
when they said you
might be four, Boris.
You could have been
seven or eight.
Somebody who has, as they say,
been around the block.
Were you hoping they’d
subtract a few years,
filling out that cat form?
Because you know
how the world is.
You’re just cruising along,
minding your own business,
not paying much attention
to the number of Christmases
rolling by.
Then one day no one
thinks you’re cute anymore.
Is cuteness a must
in the cat world, Boris?
It is in mine.
And beyond a certain age,
cuteness is an impossibility.
Nothing left but character,
and that won’t get you a
good table at a restaurant
or a warning
instead of a speeding ticket.
I know the shelter
was the pits, Boris.
I don’t mean to minimize it.
But I can think of a lot
of years
I wish I’d been given a fresh start.
Past wiped out.
New identity.
A few years shaved off.
But they don’t allow it
here in my world.
Here in my world
the forms go on forever
and they hold you
like a fly in amber.
Forever in that petri dish,
forever exactly who
your parents and your schools
and your government numbers
say you are.
It is impossible to go back
and start over.
Nearly impossible to disappear.
Were you really four, Boris,
when I found you?
No matter.
Be who you are.
6
I heard them last night,
Boris,
that pack of dogs that occasionally
runs through the neighborhood.
With my window open,
I heard them barking
and grunting
and sniffing
and panting
just outside,
on the trail of who knows what,
but glad it wasn’t you,
Boris,
glad it wasn’t you.
How did you know
to stay in?
Whenever they’ve
been through here,
every three months or so,
you’ve been tucked in
the house somewhere,
downstairs
curled with your sister,
ears sharp and twitching
as you listen to
those clumsy, dangerous
dogs outside.
How did you know
to stay in?
Was there rumor
of a rumble