Written two years after its companion piece, Lullaby for Laika, Fantasia for Félicette turns to a comparatively lesser-known story from the early Space Age to explore a different form of grief.

​

The song is inspired by Félicette, the stray cat recruited by the French space program and launched into space on October 18, 1963, becoming the first feline to make the journey beyond Earth's atmosphere. Unlike Laika, Félicette survived her mission, returning to Earth with electrodes still implanted in her brain to monitor the effects of spaceflight, but was euthanized two months later for neurological examination.

​

Rather than recounting the tragic events that would follow, Ellis Piper imagines the fragile weeks immediately after her return, when something inside her has already begun to drift beyond the reach of those who love her.

​

Through intimate lines such as “There's stardust in your eyes", “You drift when you dream", and the repeated plea, “Mais je veux que tu restes ici, avec moi" (“But I want you to stay here with me”), the song encompasses the tender ache of loving someone who is still beside you while knowing they are here on borrowed time. It is a meditation on anticipatory grief.

​

Built around shimmering piano, impressionistic harmonies inspired by French composers, and sweeping strings performed by Piper, the arrangement is layered with acoustic guitar, banjo, and ethereal ambient textures. The result is a dreamlike, weightless soundscape that drifts between Earth and the stars, mirroring the lyrics’ delicate balance between wonder and heartbreak.