Rosie is a rose, like a tiger
is an orange
Stories are layered in her stripes,
Licked from old books and stones.
On the tip of her petaled whisker, she once sprung in the long-lost belly
of ships, moored outside Deptford.
She hungers for their remains
and bites histories stranded
on storeys on the high sea streets—
she naps
coiling pasts
around her stem
watch the thorns of this lovely cat
she bides her time on the lip
of becoming
she will pounce
sharper than an orange—
a swift,
a kestrel,
a hummingbird
is an orange
Stories are layered in her stripes,
Licked from old books and stones.
On the tip of her petaled whisker, she once sprung in the long-lost belly
of ships, moored outside Deptford.
She hungers for their remains
and bites histories stranded
on storeys on the high sea streets—
she naps
coiling pasts
around her stem
watch the thorns of this lovely cat
she bides her time on the lip
of becoming
she will pounce
sharper than an orange—
a swift,
a kestrel,
a hummingbird