When you come in the living room the cat stops licking the underside of her paw and says: el-le-mai. You take a knee and lock eyes with hers and say, Try again. el-ee-may, el-ee-may. Because you have spoken this sacred word hundreds of polar bear carcasses start washing up on the Australian beachfront. Southern California is divided by a great wall of flames. Back at home, your cat flexes her claws into the couch and then gets distracted by a butterfly passing the window. Her reflection in the glass meows: el-ee-may. The ground obeys and turns to mush and now skyscrapers and mobile homes and discarded human fingernails begin sinking beneath the earth. You see the layers of dirt rising outside your window and whisper to her, Be careful with that. She turns and pounces on a cotton stuffed mouse and her tail curls into a cane. The cat purrs and says: el-ee-may, el-ee-may, el-ee-may. Stars crack open and spill out into the universe. The bones of our fathers age to cigarette ash. Somewhere in the graying light sits a blind soldier drinking water collected off the surface of the moon.