On Cohabiting With A Cat As A Religious Experience

By Clara Blair

(With apologies to Emily Dickinson, Carl Sandburg, Christopher Smart, Sinclair Lewis and Rudyard Kipling)

Papa above!
Behold the Cat
Demolishing a Rat!
Have you room within your Kingdom
For something such as that?

Emily’s cat with hungry jaws,
Sandburg’s cat with foggy paws,
Kit Smart’s cat with pious ways,
Sinclair Lewis’s cat who prays,
Lazy cat on a sun-warmed shelf,
Kipling’s cat who walks by himself!

Soft paws, soliciting strokes;
Sharp paws, reminding the dog who’s boss;
Soft fur, not always clean;
You signal the morning with loud meows
For in, if out, or out, if in.
No one can sleep like you can,
Or eat or procreate.

Busy in the twilight,
Making kittens with Pussy-from-down-the-block.
She, sure that kittens enough have been made already,
Breaks away, scampering fast as she can.
You, not so sure about that, bound after her.

O the chase!
O the joy!
O the life!

© 2004 Clara Blair