The Visitant

One night I awoke at three
bewitched by a bulbous moon,
and hobbling down the stairs for water
came upon the cat’s latest offering,
blind and helpless,
an inch long moleskin whelp,
baffling to the eye.

What have we here, I sighed:
too young to slither or yelp,
no larger than an embryo,
this half-formed vistitant
to suburbia.

I crushed it with a brick,
knowing it could not long survive,
but now those blind eyes haunt me
and at nights I rise
to where it once lay quivering
in ignorance
of my upraised hand.