CatOber 2016

Mathilde Aubier

Pat Daneman   

Lady of the House

          …and I a smiling woman…

                                      —Sylvia Plath

Husband gone
to work, it’s time

to let the madmen
out, ask them to help

slice cabbages. Children
at school, I bend back

covers of books,
peer inside empty

heads of dolls. Fat dove
at the window, color

of dishwater—so many
ways to bring the outside

in—fistful of flour,
silent, slow. 

Last night as the moon
rose, the cat went

out. I envy
his muddy boots,

old blood
matting his chin—

me with my
kitchen canisters.

Rob Carney

Economics

So we wake up before the animals.
Well, not raccoons or cats, but they don’t count;

they’re nocturnal. “The graveyard shift,” “off hours,”
“bakery hours,” whatever you call it,

it’s earlier than birds. And no songs about it. . . .
There’s truck noise on the freeway though; the malls

need stocking. Couples want to say, “It’s ours,”
tell their friends, “We got it at a discount”—

the jetted tub, the baby’s abacus
painted in primary colors, you name it.

So we’re awake while others sleep for hours,
dreaming of some strange hemisphere where owls

eat mice in daylight, where all the clocks count
backwards. . . . Nice work if you can get it.

Karen Craigo  

Your Love as That Poster of the Kitten in the Tree
 
for RJ and Michael
 
What drew you there
is obvious. There was the sky,
and morning light in the sky,
all mellow and golden,
and there were flowers,
dogwood, ironically,
flinging their scent to the wind.
And there was a toehold, a way
to raise yourself higher,
and another and yet
another, a clear path
to a loftier perspective.
Think of that air, blossoms
all around, and how always
there is a branch leading
higher. It is well
worth the climb, worth
holding on with all
you or anyone
has got.

Rose Hunter 

You As The Kitten

I found on the stoop
brought in then regretted it
not only did you rip up my purse
but I knew you liked you better than me

and often you said you were the kitten
playing with me; the herky jerk
and the rest, and it wasn’t something
you did by halves

but plunged, fully, into      
        
but a joke you said; look at you dopey
you’re lucky I like dopey
come here, come closer
dance with me in the street
kittens in the street.

[from You As Poetry (Texture Press, 2013)]

Sarah J. Sloat  

The Persian’s Reach

Wick sodden with paraffin –
a belly of flame quivers.

Hours pass, pussy footing.

Near the ceiling, a moth ruffles
the valance. Exquisite
whimper of the doorjamb.

What keeps the mistress?

Will the dark, too,
fly over?

[First published in FRiGG]

More Art by Mathilde Aubier

CatOber 2015

Cat-at-Strophe 2014

In Cat Country 2014