Poem: 'Lost Cat'

I'm going to try to write a prompted poem each week in 2023, encouraged by New Jersey poet Dimitri Reyes. We'll see how this goes. 🙂 The first prompt? "Write a poem about lost or forgotten things."

The type may be a bit small. Forgive me. It's meant to fit on a single page, so I can tack it to a telephone pole.

LOST CAT 

This is Moco.

He’s an adopted black-and-white calico,

separated from his siblings, Coco and Loco, and entrusted to my care.

 

In this recollected image,

he’s kneading the blue chenille trim on the coverlet of my boyhood bed.

I’ve fallen asleep, lulled by his incessant purr.

 

Last seen:

Nearly 60 years ago, after collapsing, after scaling the stairs to my room.

Dad tried to hide Moco from me under an empty white pillowcase.

 

It draped his stiff body, as if he were costumed as an ironic ghost.

I uncovered his face to let him breathe.

Instead, he lay motionless and wide-eyed; tiny white bubbles lined his mouth.

 

I know who killed Moco.

 

It was the loud widow and her two sons. One was a recluse, the other a bully.

I could watch them from my window: the shell of their abandoned car

on the lawn of our suburban neighborhood, sheltering vermin, beckoning cats.

 

The recluse once cheated me out of a prized baseball card. The bully laughed.

The recluse knew how to poison any living thing. This is what I know:

The bully goaded him into it so he could examine the corpses of rodents.

 

The widow died. Their house sold at a discount to cover debt.

Their car disappeared. Then the sons died too,

and all the vermin, and all the cats.

 

Meanwhile, Dad sits by the window in my old bedroom.

I pull a blanket over his thin legs. His eyes have a vacant expression.

The shell of this man listens to children play in the widow’s haunted yard.

 

I am clueless.

I post this here, desperate for answers on how to recover my cat.

I await your call, although I can offer no reward.

 

| 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 |

| 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |

| 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 |

| - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |

| 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 |

| 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 |

| 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 |

| - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |

| 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 |

| 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |

| 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 |

| 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 |