It was nineteen eighty

Peter Sellers was dead

my hero, his voices

inside my head

I bought a house

relationship failed

she wouldn't move in

the grass in the garden was

deadly long - scrubland

in heat - ventured through it

with scythe and song

at a swing and then

I found the cat

a clump of fur

on a bed of rough grass

lifting it with its light dead weight

was a tampering with animal fate

a semblance of life as yet remained

I placed him on a patch of floor

in a cardboard box

a saucer of milk and a little grain

he started to purr at my gentle stroking

I never actually saw his eyes

knew i'd done a duty of sorts

in the morning its mouth had dropped

as I knelt I saw the milk untouched

the coffin of cardboard undisturbed

I thought of Peter Sellers again

and thought I felt a sensation of pain.