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Sport 35: Winter 2007

Names

page 126

Names

When Claude Debussy
died our friend
Ljuba who lives in

Amsterdam
by the canal
decided from now on

her life would be
catless—no more
midnight serenades,

no more 2 a.m.
scratching at the
window, no more

visits to the
vet with frostbitten
ears and battle

wounds. Now she would
travel. She practiced
places-names aloud—

'Grand Rapids'
'Patagonia'
savouring the sound—

page 127

until, that is, a
ginger stray, half-grown,
with paws like

a lion cub came
by. His purr was
a consonant,

his growl spoke
of the Caucasus. She
called him Pushkin.