<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Claire, the flat-packed cat<\/strong><\/p>\n Your crumbs have been under the highchair a fortnight now. I can smell you on the fibres of Claire, the IKEA cat; Sometimes I hold her tight to my chest. That\u2019s when I feel your weight <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Daniel Roy Connelly<\/strong> was born in England but has spent much of his adult life being educated in Italy, India, Bangladesh, The USA and Scotland. Formerly a British diplomat, he has been an academic since 1999. He is currently an assistant professor of English Literature and Theatre at John Cabot University and The American University of Rome.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Claire, the flat-packed cat Your crumbs have been under the highchair a fortnight now. You were still so new to me. You used to practice each and every burgeoning word, clumsily cutting up syllables, thinning them out as you bore down on your most recent find. I want to hear you. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5079"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5081,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5079\/revisions\/5081"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nYou were still so new to me.
\nYou used to practice each and every burgeoning word,
\nclumsily cutting up syllables, thinning them out
\nas you bore down on your most recent find.
\nI want to hear you.<\/p>\n
\nthe flat-packed cat, your Mama and Diddy called her,
\nlaughing at how hard it all was.
\nShe I cradle at sleepy time,
\nkissing her matted head,
\nI am parched and angry and I ache
\nto feel your weight on my left arm.
\nYou could cut off the blood in minutes.<\/p>\n
\nPerhaps in the afternoons, when I am tired and tense,
\nI smooth her face against my blood-shot cheeks.
\nWe move in no less a general way than
\nwould any toy cat and man dancing.<\/p>\n
\non my skin,
\nlike a package new delivered
\nas the Valium kicks in,
\nas I sway you slowly
\nto our song or maybe songs.<\/p>\n