saturday, september 16, 2000
"A kitten is so flexible that she is almost double; the hind parts are equivalent to another kitten with which the forepart plays. She does not discover that her tail belongs to her until you tread on it."
~ Henry David Thoreau
These days the kittens rampage all around the room, scrabbling madly, springing splay-legged on spread-toed circular feet, pointing a new direction each time they hit the floor, leapfrogging, bat-leaping, bat-frogging, Jiffy Popping, flinging catnip mice into the stratosphere, rearing and waving arms like kodiaks, hopping off sideways with their backs in Gothic arches and tails puffed like chimney brushes.
They rocket into the bookcase and stuff themselves between paperbacks, then dive onto the twig rocker, setting it madly rocking. They bound like vicunas through the twig footstool's circles.
We gave them a walnut branch, and they shinny up it like high-speed tree surgeons. Or pull themselves along the underside, backs sliding on the hardwood floor. They take running leaps onto it, hug it against their bellies, and spin right around ~ an old kid trick called skin the cat.
They crash bonk! headfirst into the shiffarobe.
Don't walk in there wearing no socks. Dozens of needly teeth and claws will land all over your ankles.
Piranhas!
Image: Chessie, the Piranha
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