if you please--draw me a sheep...

there are five of them. kittens. a feral cat deposited them in the shed. she is wiley. defeated the hav-a-hart trap. but i stole the kittens. they eat from the milk syringe and have a fondness for cashmere sweaters. one has white-rimmed eyes. owl-eyed. he's noisy and also irresistible. one has a pointed face. black. siamese. she's very smart and after feeding the nipple's exit makes a distinct popping noise. she does everything with all her might. one is grey and yowly. one is so terribly wall-eyed that i avoid looking directly into his face. he's one of my favorites but the sight of him makes me laugh. and laughing thus generates a bit of guilt. one has white tipped toes and hisses.

this is not the first litter she's left for us. i stole and bottle fed the last batch as well. she's a kitten machine. so it's imperative that we catch her and alter her. i hate altering. fixing doesn't sound nice either. from the other litter the brother retained three. a matching set of tabbies and their silver sister. today he was well enough to be outside teasing bertrand-cat with a long willow switch. he reached into the tree to gather other switches. i yelled at him. he is still incisioned after all. and terribly stubborn.

the sister and i walked to the place of the olivetti. i came away with a stately aeonium. looks like landed brachiopod stalk. something dredged up shiny. also the very heavy carven bird. wooden. i carried the aeonium wobbly in its pot. the sister carried a bag of loot in which the wooden magpie rested. plastic bag. and then at once the magpie had awled the plastic with his bill. it looked ridiculous. we laughed. another three steps and he fell out onto his head. the bill and tail are chipped. tonight i'll smooth over this with a sandy square of paper. then anoint him with oil.

maybe it's a seagull. there's no such thing. maybe it's a gull then.

some books. the favorite little prince. and for the father's birthday a copy of austin tappan wright's islandia. he already owned several of those. but he lends books something fierce. even after we gifted him with the giant m embosser the books stray. never find their way home again. anyway he loves islandia.

thanked my lucky stars to have had the headphones today. the time in transit is improved. vastly. listened over and again to medulla. i gave it a break for several months but i'm back on it again. and bjork always sounds best with phones i think.

while waiting i watched several layered shadows on the concrete. sycamore just coming into leaf. but really not sycamore but shadows. and my brain is so much smarter than me. won't abandon the sycamore. nor abandon distinction. it's a sycamore. it's a tree. it's a tree. a tree. etc. but when a big wind blew through the top of the tree (the actual tree) the upmost branches moved. the lower contrariwise. then very soon it was not a tree an actual tree. it was just shadow. and then it was just movement. and hrrrrrrrunn too too hrrrrrrunn too too.... then it was almost a state of hypnosis.

the little prince escaped by bird. it's a point of importance. a matter of consequence. he has interesting views concerning horticulture too. or so the narration would lead me to believe.

but seeds are invisible. they sleep deep in the heart of the earth's darkness, until some one among them is seized with the desire to awaken. then this little seed will stretch itself and begin--timidly at first--to push a charming little sprig inoffensively upward toward the sun.

also flowers are not at all afraid of tigers.

now for magpie and sleep.