Ode to Hemingway

A short illustrative essay I wrote for class about my cat.

   Hemingway the cat is the embodiment of feline perfection. Perched in a regal fashion upon the windowsill, he peers out into unknown peons before him as he is illuminated by delicate tendrils of sunlight. The gray and white splotches in his pelt are reminiscent of dark clouds devouring their white siblings just before a rainfall, but even those lofty denizens of the heavens would hang their heads in shame if they felt the intoxicating softness of his shimmering fur. He is heavy, both contemplative and full of inertia; the weight of his intellect is equaled by his massive form, and from whisker to tail, his graceful curves seem to have been carved from the finest marble by some divine master sculptor. Together, his diminutive head and the girth of his rotund flanks are complementary " a study in harmony and symmetry. His face is a vision of beauty, and as he turns to inspect the room behind him, his mighty expression commands respect and forcefully inspires the imagination, like words never-before-heard, cackled in unearthly voices. Though stoic and silent, he possesses the temperament of a perpetually disgruntled aristocrat, and looks upon the world at once as his kingdom, and also his greatest fear. Upon the entry of a stranger, his half-narrowed eyes widen and gleam with skittish intensity. They are the eyes of a man many years his senior, and they leak like overflowing sinks with stories left untold and wisdom never heard. Preparing to alight, his enormous forepaws brace the ledge he occupies and show his namesake: each bears a polydactylic digit missing in lesser cats. Hemingway the statuette transforms into a silent blur as he makes his speedy escape and retreats into an impossibly small crevice to avoid detection. He is Felis purfectus, superior both in form and action.