Daphne was the first being that I ever raised and cared for, from earliest childhood until the end. She passed away two weeks ago, and I miss her terribly. She never meeowed, instead she “talked” in the weirdest sounds. I wrote some of her favourite “words” down in music, so that her stories shall remain. Meet the cattiest cat …

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The Cattiest Cat

I had a cat, and Daphne was her name.
I got her when she was still very small,
and ugly like a bat, an ugly one.
She had all ailments and all maladies a tiny cat could have,
a wandering bag of fleas and bugs.
But she got better.
Her fur grew back, black as a panther she would be, with eyes of glowing green, like emeralds.
She slept in my lap, she slept on my back, she slept on my chest,
and when she didn’t sleep, she hid, for she was very shy.
And with the passing of the years she grew – a little.
And – though still tiny – she became a beauty and a clown.
And she got chatty, not like others cats, who do meow,
she purred and cooed and curred, and told me stories:
In the morning she would tell me how she starved to death that night, again!
When I came home she’d tell me all adventures that she’d had,
like chasing monsters,
or like how she caught the pidgeon on the balcony (she never did).
And sometimes in a midnight frenzy she would fly – wide-eyed and wild – through all the wilderness that was the living room, the kitchen, and then slay the couch by clawing it to death.
So she was rightfully awarded her new title: Monkey Princess.
She slept in my lap, she slept by my side when I was working,
and – as she got older – she slept in my sweater like I was her mother kangaroo.
Just yesterday she wandered through the rooms and sang, as often she had done, the songs and legends of her folk,
before I took her to the vet to have a tooth removed.
But yesterday it was All Hallows’ Eve.
And as the doctor made the Monkey Princess take a nap,
her spirit wandered off into the other land,
where there is no more need to breathe.

Now come the days of many things that are the first in many years:
The first time getting up without the purr and coo of morning’s song,
the first time in the bath without the princess dipping in her tail then to be chased by it and all it’s frightening drops,
the first time coming home to no adventures being told,
the first time sitting, waiting, but no little panther sneaking up to pad me on the arm, so that I lift her up and put her in my pouch.
But after all these first times, there will be second times, and third, and many afterwards.
And as the image of the Monkey Princess fades from my life by day and day,
I will remain the proudest mother kangaroo,
to have been chosen by a tiny soul
to be all hers.

– Sascha Selke, November 1st, 2018