My cat knows gravity to well It binds him, grinds away His softened bones Stripped and stretched Against his paper skin His vertebrae, alas, have long been tied And twisted taut by time With lines and hooks, the dirty rope That drowns us all Is pulling him to every root We need him Cries the earth, it aches For knows it does He is more element then whole And gravity,a force to great To hold in fist Has cracked his frame And drawn his body in So weighed with bags of sand he slips And I can see him Shrink before my eyes