Short Catlike Poems

cat 
floats over wall 
leaves crunch...

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You yank me from my curtain climb
     But I shall nap and bide my time.

             You'll pass by soon enough....

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The whisper of a whisker
At my window
Scratches at my eardrums
Like inch-long nails on a chalkboard
In the hot sweaty classroom
Where I grew old
So like a student greets the bell
I greet the reaper
Who stares at me through the glass
Through the night
Through thin slits
In catlike eyes...

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This  special willow (Salix Caprea)
Is an early spring-blooming small tree.
The fuzzy little catlike blooms
Are very interesting to see.

Put these willow branches into water
And force them into early bloom.
It’s fun to watch them grow and open.
They’ll cheer up any wintry room.

By Joyce Johnson February 26 2012...

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Jimmy wished he was a cat
Not a kitten, but a full-grown caterwauling tom
He prayed about it every night for ten years
One morning he saw catlike qualities in the mirror
I look like a cat! He said.
I have whiskers like a cat!
I need a litter box.
So he made himself one out of a long dishpan
His mother kicked him out shortly afterwards...

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We stood upon the ripe
Dunes
Looking down upon the shorn
Tops
Of holly trees wading in the
Sunken
Hiatus, splayed between 
Ocean
And Great South 
Bay.
The lawntrees were 
Rippling
In the fervid air. Then
Catlike 
We plunged into the cool 
Emerald 
Arbored depths: Everything is
Green
Like her sunglasses there.

This little poem is another rare piece of juvenilia preserved from my college years at UF (1977-80). ...

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Parisian nights magical made for hand in hand walking
Along the light sparkling Seine,
Across bridges running to old left bank enclaves
Magic nights soft city lights
Footsteps echo into alleys
Taxis purr catlike in misty morning dew
Who walks in these early hours just before dawn?
Bakers rolling croissants, freshly baking
Deliveries of flowers, papers, breads
All in sleepy just light …
You and I, hand in hand,  find our way home
Under flowering purple trees...

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