Tatiana by Mike Grigsby / Daddy

I hurt so bad right now. Tatiana, my love, you were the most precious gift. I know you’re sleeping now, but it hurts so bad to not have you here. Almost 10 years together, and I remember like yesterday the day you found your tail and chased it for hours; or how you’d jump up the wall 3 feet chasing the laser pointer; or how you decided to use the litter box in the floorboard of the car while we were traveling 80 miles an hour in the middle of Wyoming. I remember how you’d try to get those darned seagulls, even though they were two flights down, and I remember how I nearly caught you on fire (scared me a lot worse than you). My life feels really empty, and I’m sorry your last days were not spent being well, but I know you’re not in pain any longer. I’ll always love you.

Rub’ al Khali

I heard the term used

As regards

A particular geographic area

in Saudi Arabia:

The Empty Quarter.

I look at the corner of

the room where once stood

your scratching post,

your food dish,

your water bowl —

It’s now an empty quarter.

Your litter box is gone

(Of that, I’m not

entirely unhappy)

But it still leaves

An empty quarter.

That space on my bed

I always saved for you

–there too is an empty quarter.

Yet the biggest, most impossible

empty quarter

Is

The one left in my heart.

 

Godspeed, little one,
Tatiana
22, Dec 2006
Mike Grigsby