The good folks at Meow Poetry are looking for poems about cats, involving cats, or that are cat-like in their nature, for a poetry anthology to be published in Fall 2009. Take the cat theme as far and wide as you want – they’ll consider poems about Catwoman and the Broadway musical Cats if that’s where the words go.

All genre of poetry will be considered from haiku to sonnets to limericks to free verse.

Here are some specs:

Poems should be 50 lines or less. Original, unpublished work is preferred. Previously-published exceptional work will be considered. Include full citation. No reader or submission fees. No remuneration for accepted work. A portion of any profits will be donated to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA), the first humane society to be established in North America — an excellent organization dedicated to the care of cats, dogs and all non-human friends.

How/where to submit:

Email poems and a brief three- to five-sentence bio to meow.poetry@yahoo.com . Submissions can be either in the body of the email or as an attached Word.doc. Email subject line should read: Meow Submission: Your Name.

Deadline: July 1, 2009

Poets will receive emails of acceptance / rejection and notification when the published book is available.

Get to it.

Cross Over is the child of a poem I was working on a couple of years ago called Found Cat. The trigger came when Jacko, who belonged to our friends Scott and Kelly, was hit by a car as he was either resting in or crossing the street. They called us as soon as it happened because Scott was literally on his way to the airport for a work-related flight out of town. We went to their house and helped Kelly bury Jacko in the back yard. A night or two later, Kelly related a dream in which Jacko came in the house from the backyard, all cleaned up and new and ready for another life. In both versions below, the “I” narrator stumbles upon the dead cat and tries to help him on his way.

Cross Over

I’d like to be a hand for you,
a heart, mouth
for a world of words
or just tongue
for wounds you can’t lick.
Stranded as you are, a dead cat
in the road – fresh killed,
an eye-ball gone, blood
and skull exposed
from the hit that did you in.

I have a shirt – I’ll cover you.
You like this, how could you not?
A collar but no name,
someone’s long gone friend -
let’s skirt the streets,
go door to door
to find your bed, food bowl,
scratched up couch
where you honed your claws.

You look fine, a little scared,
a fang hanging out
so death knew what you thought
when it bore down
from the grill of that car. I know -

you were robbed, didn’t get
the ninth life. No one does.
Let’s reflect tonight.
I’ll bury you in the yard,
warm like mother’s rest.

When you’re ready,
clean up for a final pounce.
Scratch at the door.
I’ll fix dinner, scruff your neck
before you head to the road
you must cross.

Found Cat

I carry the dead cat
door to door to horrified looks.
Whatever did him in
knocked an eyeball out, a blotch
of blood where an ear was.
One fang hangs from his lip,
shows death what he thinks.

No one claims the fat
warm thing. I take him home
without name, dig a grave
through my yard’s hard earth.

I have no prayer,
just a stranger over his plot.
I trickle dirt back in,
lay stone and nod.

At night he scratches
through the door. Cleaned, his parts
repaired, he heads back to the road
he never crossed.