I’m afraid of fear so it’s hard to say when I’m afraid because I’m afraid of naming the fear at all. My mom says not to name something unless you want to keep it. Names build attachment. Mostly she meant this in the context of all of the stray cats I kept bringing home and the cat limit that she imposed on our house. (It was two but I eventually talked her into three and at one point there were four.) So I say I’m not afraid of anything while fear tickles the back of my throat, scratching for significance, trying to scream itself out of my shadows and into the light. I think fear sees the way I constantly name the cats. I think fear fears that I will never name it. But I’d rather talk about the cats—protectors of the underworld. Cats combat the fear. I’d rather have cats scratching at me than terror; I could never fear a cat. It’s largely possible that death will befall me in the form of a large and dangerous feline, because I can’t see the danger between their whiskers, much like I can’t name my fear. It’s a dream of mine to someday lay in the arms of a lion. I don’t think about death because when I do it always comes with fear by its side. Actually, I think about death all too often, I just don’t name it. I think about a lot of things that I don’t want to name because I don’t want to keep them. Death will come when it comes and I want to find it the way I’ve found every cat—not looking for them, not running from them, just accepting them with open arms. If everything in life came like a cat then there would be no fear left to name. There might even be world peace, if not for a few things constantly being knocked over. Maybe I should name my fear Feline. Maybe if I call it Cat, it will transform into one, and then there will be no fear left at all.
As published by Honeyguide Literary Magazine, November 2024
Lisa Hartsgrove 