Shrike

on my way to buy ice cream one morning, i found this kitten, run-over or dog-bit but never-the-less back-broken with internal organs visible and making noises no animal should ever ever ever make.
& so... i left him there... mewing in the street and i bought my ice cream and i damn near prayed, and i dont pray, that he would be dead by the time i circled back...
but he wasnt.... he lay there, circled by his brothers and sisters, his mother pacing in the alley, worrying the remainder of her kittens.... she hissed when i returned with a towel and gently bundled him up.... but she knew he was gone and i carried him home as his jaws snapped shut over and over again..... tiny pain-filled clicks....
and i tell you, i felt tough and able and matter-of-fuckin-fact about the whole affair.... i felt that death is is just one of those shit things and mercy-killing an animal, even a kitten, is something one should take in stride.... i felt this stoic emotionless purpose right up until the end.... the end of him.....
fuck, as i held the air-tight bag i had placed him in, as i held him in my lap and talked to him telling him i was sorry so so sorry so very fucking sorry he never had a chance..... and as as as he started to kick, despite his pain, despite his crushed spine, as i felt him struggle for breath, as i felt him struggle to go on living, as i fucking murdered him in the name of mercy.... i wept.
and as i wept i realized it was the first time i had wept in years.
god can go fuck itself.
i didnt sign on to this lunatic life to kill kittens before breakfast.