also loved his wife
and smoked small,
imported cigarettes.
He sometimes recited his poems
in odd places
and often drank too much beer.
The man who loved cats
was very old
but only a fool
would step outside with him
if the invitation were offered.
He played the horses regularly
and could often be seen at the track
where no one noticed him,
just as he preferred.
The important things
were his wife and his poetry,
the horses,
and maybe the cats
more than the rest.
.
And when he died
the cats grieved,
as did a few people,
and that was plenty.
The poems stopped
the only way they could,
and he was remembered
for a time,
then mostly forgotten,
as were the poems.
Do not mistake my meaning.
This is the happiest of stories.
This is how it’s done.
Jeff Weddle is a poet and writer living in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He won the 2007 Welty Prize for Bohemian New Orleans: The Story of the Outsider and Loujon Press, and has also received honors for his fiction and poetry. Jeff teaches in the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Alabama.
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