It's Still Life

The Cat and the Sardine Campaign
(Or: This is How a Cat Conquers a Tin of Sardines, Miss Violet 😂)

The cat sits in the middle of the kitchen floor,
a tin of French sardines clutched between his paws.
The good kind.
The lemony kind.
The kind the Old Woman hides on the top shelf
behind the oatmeal.

He has acquired it.
How is not important.
What matters is the ring-pull.
And the war.

1st ATTEMPT: THEATRICAL LEAN

He hooks one claw through the pull-tab,
leans backward with the full weight
of his outrage and ancestral ambition,
and pulls.

The tin does not move.
He does.
Backward.
Into the recycling bin.

He emerges, dignity slightly dented,
and glares at the tin.

“Sabotage.
The ring is slippery.
Probably French.”

2nd ATTEMPT: BRUTE FORCE

He drags the tin onto the kitchen floor,
positions it just so,
and hurls it against the wall.

It bounces.
Pathetically.
Unimpressed.

He tries again.
Bounce.
Again.
Bounce.

The Old Woman doesn’t look up.
“The wall isn’t hungry, cat.”

“The wall,” he hisses,
“is an accomplice.”

3rd ATTEMPT: LEVERAGE

He finds a pencil, chewed, but functional,
slips it through the ring-pull,
and leans.

The pencil skitters across the room,
followed by the cat,
who slides to a stop
beneath the refrigerator.

He emerges with dust on his whiskers
and murder in his heart.

“Poor engineering.
The pencil is compromised.
Probably British.”

4th ATTEMPT: PATIENCE

He sits on the tin.
Sits.
Stares.
Waits.

“Surrender,” he whispers.
“I have all afternoon.
I have existential stamina.
I have nothing but time
and resentment.”

The tin does not surrender.
His tail does.
It twitches.
Betrayed by biology.

5th ATTEMPT: PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE

He knocks the tin off the counter.
Again.
And again.
And again.

The Old Woman sighs.
“If I open it, will you stop?”

The cat pauses.
Considers.
“I will consider stopping.
After one more dramatic drop.”

He drops it.
She opens it.
The lid pops.
The scent of lemon and oil
rises like victory.

AND FINALLY: THE CONQUEST

The cat looks at the open tin.
Looks inside.
Sees the sardines — gleaming,
available,
defeated.

He sniffs once.
Twice.
Then walks away.

The Old Woman blinks.
“Aren’t you going to eat them?”

The cat settles into a sunbeam,
tail curled,
expression serene.

“The pleasure was the conquest,
Old Woman.
The strategy.
The struggle.
The tiny, salty victory
over physics and French engineering.

The sardines are merely
evidence.

You may have them.
On toast.”

He closes his eyes.
And purrs.