stares at me, feral creature eyes wide open -- windows to the wilderness of her gentle savagery stares, in intense curiosity and the silence of her kind -- a quality of presence we know from the toddler staring overtly, unabashedly a shibboleth of her blunt interest she regales me with her mindfulness and I embrace her warmly running my fingers through her fur manhandling her small head until she purrs contentedly [25-II-2022]