Diogenes the Cat

Alexander stood tall, a king among kings,
but he found himself shaded by the sun
of a man who owned nothing but a dirty cloak
and a sharper tongue than any sword.

Diogenes,
a cat in human skin,
lounged in his barrel,
eyes half-closed, indifferent to the grandeur.

“Move,” he said, “you’re blocking my light.”
And Alexander, in his glittering armor,
moved.

“If I weren’t Alexander,”
the king mused,
“I’d wish to be Diogenes.”
A compliment to some,
but the philosophicat only smirked,
“If I weren’t Diogenes,
I’d wish to be Diogenes too.”

A cat knows no master,
bows to no throne,
follows no rules but its own.
It is not insubordination,
but pure independence,
a freedom so complete
it defies the very notion of command.

Kings kneel to gods,
to nations,
to the whispers of power.
But a cat,
like Diogenes,
bends to nothing,
answers to no one.

A king might command armies,
but he cannot command the sun,
or the spirit of a creature
who lives by his own rules,
shaded only by his own furry skin.

So Alexander moved,
and Diogenes stayed,
a cat in a world of police dogs,
a free man in a city of slaves,
a sun unto himself.