Cat on Lap by Casey Bloome

Cat on Lap is not only a love poem to my cat. It's that too (it was written entirely in an hour while I had my cat on my lap), but it's also a poem about COVID lockdowns, not only because it was written during that time, but also because it's about the mindset one gets when being forced to stay in one place. Lockdown forced many of us to slow down an reexamine how we were spending our time. Some activities were restricted, as were many of the locations we had frequented before the pandemic. Many of our worlds stopped in their tracks, forcing us to spend time with our own thoughts. Cat on Lap is a microcosm of that, an example of how one sees the world and their own thoughts when spending time under lockdown in order to care for others.

Cat On Lap
12 November 2020

Is there any better comfort than a cat on lap?
How she purrs upon your pant leg as she takes a nap?
She’s a pleasant interruption to a game of skill
While she inhales and she exhales as I hold so still
Now the game has long concluded and I’m still sat here
As I wrestle with dilemmas of a grateful fear:
That my writing of a poem while she’s on my thigh
Will disturb her quiet slumber and she’ll say goodbye

I can see the murmuration of her lustrous pelt
As if any little stimulus would make her melt
And I wonder if her dreaming in the land of Nod
Gets a seismic excitation when my movement’s odd
Because like my lovely creature in her dreams so deep,
I can feel by agitation that my leg’s asleep

I am honored she considers me a prizéd chair
But to any seat auditioners, you must beware
There’s commitment necessary in this tense career
For as long as she is sleeping I’m imprisoned here

It is fortunate for both my loving cat and I
That before she took her seat I had the thought to pry
My phone from my right pocket so there were no mounds
To besmirch the plains of Legland and cause cat face frowns
But connectedly to mitigate her landlord’s ward
Meaning I’ve my phone to comfort me and not get bored.

Now her weight shifts as her now unconscious mind forgets
That her resting on my legs requires no upsets
Of the kind involving tumbling off of my knees
She adjusts her pose accordingly, with feline ease.

Did you know that even sleeping cats remain aware
Of surroundings and disturbances which cause her care?
It’s this semi-conscious agileness that I just saw
When she shifted her own gravity with one long paw
As (contrary to her compactness) she stretched it out
So observers who observe her have no cause to doubt
That these moments, although fleeting, are the rare events
Which display her majesticity and elegance.

Now the time has come to stir again and break her bliss
Though I may get rotten looks or an ungrateful hiss
There’s no audience who’s watching and who’ll softly clap
At performances as humble as this cat on lap.