Validation

Validation

My cat, Mau Mau, sits at the open door of my home

Thinking cat thoughts, wondering cat sorts of things

As he watches the evening sky

Turn from blue to gray to black

He breathes cat breaths and his heart

Beats with a cat heartbeat

The rhythms his cat thoughts,

Cat breaths and cat heartbeat make

Are their own reason for existing,

And he is comfortable with no more validation for living

Than the life spark coursing through his veins

It is good, I think, every so often,

To strip away from ourselves

All the heavy trappings of our culture,

All the striving, and talking about

What's gonna be on the TV next week,

And worrying about paying the bills,

Down to the sorts of rhythms our human

Heartbeats and breaths make,

And feel once again for ourselves

That same sort of validation for being alive

That needs no more reason

Than the simple fact that we exist

Dewey Dirks