A Literary Magazine in Support of the Jewish Community
Knit Your Own Cat This Election
Someone created a pattern
for an American shorthair,
for a Blue Russian. CO. K1P2
and so on, all the cryptic directions
from tail to whiskers,
these cats lounging quietly
on the back of a chair,
on a window ledge looking out.
These cats, we think, are self-centered,
loving the ones who feed them
until fed. K2tog. Dec. Sl1P.
Small cats, large ears. We used
to worry about listeners; we watched
our language when little ones
could hear, counted to 10, spoke
in a different language if we knew
one. Pas devant les enfants,
my mother would say, and her parents
used Russian or Hebrew or slipped
from one to the other. Today, open
mouth, as in, I can't believe he said
that; or more, that so many don’t mind.
What goes on in back rooms
catches the mic, repeats, a fly
buzzing at the window
in the hovering shadow of a paw.
The cats slip in and out. sssk. Cont.
Janet Bowdan
Janet Bowdan's poems have appeared in APR, Tahoma Literary Review, The Rewilding Anthology, Sequestrum, Lit Shark, and elsewhere. The editor of Common Ground Review, she teaches at Western New England University and lives in Northampton, Massachusetts with her husband, their son, and a very sweet book-nibbling chinchilla.
