Matthew King

Glass

My cat paws at the window glass. An inch
away, a see-through feeder holds a finch.
It’s calmly eating seeds. It doesn’t flinch

but panics at a glimpse of me, four feet
behind. The cat’s intent is clear: to eat
the bird — no hint of pretense or deceit.

But what’s the plot I’m trying to disguise,
the finch might wonder, bringing fresh supplies
each day? Since it can’t read my mind, it flies.

It’s satisfied the only way the cat
can see to get it is straight through, and that
will never work. With me, it smells a rat.

Who knows how many tricks I’ve got to try?
The cat, though, worries just one thought: if I
dig long and hard enough, that bird will die.


Closer

Its little caps would hit you right about
the head, above the urinal, between
the tiles, steadily pencilled in the grout:
THIS IS THE CLOSEST WE HAVE EVER BEEN.
“Have ever been to what?” you might’ve thought,
or maybe, “Who are you to call us ‘we’?”
Perhaps you’d’ve considered “this” — this spot,
this moment, ending when you’re out of pee?
You might’ve; I knew what it meant to say,
and every time I went I got a thrill
at how, by changing not a letter day
by day, it told me we were closer still —
it tells me now, though not there anymore,
we’re closer than we ever were before.

Matthew King used to teach philosophy at York University in Toronto, Canada; he now lives in what Al Purdy called “the country north of Belleville”, where he tries to grow things, counts birds, takes pictures of flowers with bugs on them, and walks a rope bridge between the neighbouring mountaintops of philosophy and poetry. His photos and links to his published poems can be found at birdsandbeesandblooms.com.