TAKING A DRIVE

driving down a back road
taking a drive through
Eastern Shores Maryland
going fast, feeling the car
as it purrs and hums under my
direction, the stereo plays as
the black top blurs in front of me
and behind in the rearview
the day is unseasonably warm
for late February, i can hear the hum
of the electricity in the powerlines
as i go fast, faster, harder then i should
i cannot help myself, the adrenaline rushes
then from out of nowhere, there is a farm
coming into view, something made me
slow down, there is a corral with horses
so i feel the need to stop-there were
two brown and white females and one
shiny black stallion, they were running back
and forth, the length of the enclosure
stopping every once in a while to feast
on alfalfa- i was awestruck, not sure why i stopped
but just taking a moment to watch beauty
in motion gave me pause, i never really took the time to
just slow down and appreciate my surroundings, i
watched them a couple minutes more,  just leaning
against the fence, taking in the moment, when out of nowhere
a black sports car was racing past me down the same road
i was on, at the same rate of speed i was doing before i
stopped, a police cruiser was right on his tail in
hot pursuit- when i got back into my car, i thought to
myself, hey that could have been me.

by Michael Perry

For most of my life
I yearned for the simple
independence of a feline
existence, a house cat
that spends more time
outside exploring and
roaming, then inside
snoring.

Preening and self-cleaning,
eating human food offerings
at will or not, everything on
my terms having my way with
the humans, they being such easy
creatures to bamboozle and train.

No matter how much I
ignore them, hiss or scratch
they treat me like some highly
revered object. A King perhaps?

Now that I am older and wiser
my feline ambitions have been
largely met. Being left mostly
alone with lots of cat naps, all
on my fully autonomous terms
and conditions. Roaming sparingly,
preferring the inside comforts of
home over the cold wet outside.

Please wake me if you have
any questions. But understand
I may not answer as I might be
napping. Or choose too merely
ignore you, as that is what cats
can and often do. And even at
times we humans may too.

Up in the backwoods
Of Michigan, lives the
Traveling man name of Tim.
He's in a band, with a million fans, and I think it is a sin, that he's in better shape than I am, and I'm ******* younger than him.
Ever since he got bit by that possum, he will never be the same again.