Of cats and snail mail
It is rare these days to submit a poem in hard print and send it via snail mail. When the reply came in a paid-by-publisher envelope I was over the proverbial moon.
The hard copy poetry magazine Oxygen arrived 8 weeks later, with my two poems bookending the poetry section. Check it out, Oxygen Issue 2, October 2021. A magazine in full colour with visual art, articles and poems.
Mentored
In comes the cat
hairs afloat on the air
trailing sunlight
She perches herself on white
granite – a singular ray of sun
Her green eyes half open glint
She stretches her spine
yawns, sits, looks
As he watches the cat
thoughts leave his mind’s
holding room
He sits up
places his palms in front of him
The room blurs – his hands distant objects
How to see, hear, love, thank, be, now
Somewhere below heart and lungs
his diaphragm purrs like a cat
In a room where all drapes are drawn
a lifetime of sheaths
the cat uncurls her body
He pushes through layers
velvet, linen, organza
Lets in the light
Tineke Van der Eecken
Photo: Pussy Maw by James Kerr