Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1601252105400.15039@panix3.panix.com>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
To: Cyb <cybermind@listserv.wvu.edu>, Wryting-L <WRYTING-L@listserv.wvu.edu>
Subject: for Ossi Oswalda, +/- 2005 - 1/25/2016
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 21:10:31 -0500 (EST)
Ossi Oswalda, +/- 2005 - 1/25/2016 http://www.alansondheim.org/ossinow1.jpg Ossi, sleeping, about a year ago http://www.alansondheim.org/elegyforossi.mp3 http://www.alansondheim.org/preludeforossi.mp3 2 qin on the elegy, slightly detuned they are coming together of their own accord qing qin on the prelude This morning, we had to put our companion cat, Ossi Oswalda, down; she was fading rapidly and we were worried she was on the verge of catastrophic failure. She had been with us for eight years, had been unwanted, and when she joined us, she was already three years old, very sick, and fierce. For the first seven years with us, she slept alone; just this past year, she joined us on the bed. She never, until today, sat or lay on our laps; today, before the procedures which put her to permanent sleep and peacefulness, she lay down on Azure's lap for the first time. We are bereft, beside ourselves; she was a deep and fundamental member of our family, and she remade the architecture of our place to her own liking, a remaking that changed faster than our own placements. Her sounds, while we slept, formed the basis of our sleep; her presence provided a mobile punctum which moved constantly. She died young, of kidney failure, possibly cancer, heart murmur, diabetes, and possibly stroke, but she had a good life with us. I'm always amazed at the worlding of organisms, from humans all the way across the great disks of lifeforms, and Ossi opened up new and whole ways of thinking, movement, and structure for us. We miss her, we miss ourselves, and what we can say is that she went peacefully, and without pain, and her pain was growing as she slowly, then quickly, was giving out. Last night was the last night she slept with us, we were already in mourning and those inclement regions of darkness which will swallow us all. Rest in peace, Ossi. For her namesake, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ossi_Oswalda Thank you for reading, if you have the time, please listen to the elegy and prelude. - Alan and Azure