Cat Poems I
Gail White

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Mom! Nicky’s hogging the water again.“

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Cat Spotting

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I have been one acquainted with the cats.

I know the twistings of their crooked hearts,

the music of their mews, the sharps and flats,

the way one cat can play a hundred parts,

mother and child, dancer and acrobat,

a loving mistress in a new mink stole,

a dominatrix whose imperious pat

can leave a scar, a healer of the soul.

All these and more in one neat package blend,

ready to claim a lap, a hand, an arm,

because they know we’re helpless in the end,

addicted to their soft, self-centered charm,

like chocolate creams and butter-laden fats.

I have been one acquainted with the cats.

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The Muezzin

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My cat awakens me to say

(while giving me her nose to kiss)

That nothing else I do today

Will be as just as this.

To feed God’s creatures anywhere

(but chiefly those within my keep)

Is my sufficient morning prayer,

And better far than sleep.

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’Cat Spotting’ was published in The Spectator; ’The Muezzin’ found a home in Purr and Yowl, an anthology of cat poems​.​

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Gail White is a formalist poet whose totem animal is the cat, as evidenced by her chapbook of cat poetry, Catechism. She lives in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, where she currently owns two cats and feeds three others.

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