I dreamed of a grey cat, who walks like a blueing mist, curling her tail around her favourites and brush-sabre rattling it at those she despises. She slinks by the edges of life and purrs at purrable things. She is fiercely honest, and embraces mystery with every silent padding pawstep. She knows when to sharpen her claws, and when to velvet them away. I have not looked her in the eyes yet, but I am sure they are round topaz wetness, liquid stone in the fog of fur, streaked with streams of moss, and that a sliver of onyx holds the centre in pupilled darkness.

She sleeps in sunbeams when they are slow enough to catch her, and curls up in shadow, happy in light and dark, her seeing clear by either. She always goes around and never through, shedding softness in a stormy carpet behind her for us to follow if we wish to, a cloud of fibrous unknowing. She does not come when called, and in any case, there is no name diaphanous enough to wrap itself around her.

I have only glimpsed the back of her, as she passes the cleft of my rocky hiding place, but as I died in my dream, I knew with all my heart I wished I had got to know her better.

text © K Dibbens-Wyatt  Photo from Pixabay