Steve Potter Reviews Purr and Yowl: An Anthology of Poetry About Cats

Purr and Yowl: An Anthology of Poetry About Cats, Edited by David D. Horowitz

reviewed by Steve Potter

Cats are the stars of most poems in Purr and Yowl: An Anthology of Poetry About Cats. In a few, though, a cat is a character actor in a supporting role or merely passes through for a brief cameo. The anthology includes work from more than one hundred poets selected by editor David D. Horowitz. It includes poems in a wide array of styles, including haiku, tanka, sonnets, free verse, and more. 

The emotional terrain of the anthology ranges from light and humorous to deeply sad. On the lighter side are poems about how fond cats are of stretching out in a patch of sunlight blazing through a windowpane. We also find several accounts of cats' charming yet annoying tendency to compete for attention with books or laptops when one is trying to read. Susan Rich's "Singing Back the Missing M”and Marge Piercy's "They call it hampering” relate to work done at a keyboard when there's an attention-hungry cat in the house.

Purr and Yowl is full of reminders of why so many of us are fascinated and enamored of felines. It's a perfect gift for the cat and / or poetry lover in your life.

Cat as predator is also a common theme in poems such as Chris Dahl's "Swiss Cats,” Nancy Canyon's "My Nocturnal Hunter,” and K.L. Johnston's "Grey Cat With Shadows.” Full disclosure: my own poems "Two Sonnets in Memory of Savage Knucklehead Thunderlord Potter the First and Only” are included in the collection and also deal with a cat that loved to hunt.  

On the somber end of the spectrum are poems about the last days and eventual deaths of old beloved pets, such as Doug Stone's "Ode to Jack” and Joannie Strangeland's Joe Brainard-inspired "Oh, Kitty Buddy,” in remembrance of a cat named Gilbert.

Yes, most of the cats in Purr and Yowl are domestic pets, but some poems involve larger members of the Felidae family, such as, "The Caracal,” by Victoria Ford, "Snow Leopard” by Kris Michelle Diesness, "The Old Lion” by Michael Fraley, and "Scrolling Facebook: The Big Cats” by Joseph Powell.

Here is the first stanza of David Denny's “Suburban Scene”:

The mountain lion sleeps in the sycamore.
He is first spotted by the jogger, who calls
the sheriff, who calls the game warden.
They stand now at a safe distance while
the animal twitches and the great black-tipped
tail sweeps. He is stretched out across
a heavy horizontal branch where trail turns
sidewalk. Nearby a plaque lists the names
of the city council who sanctioned this paving.

The cat in Timothy Steele's “The Mountain Lion of Central Park” is artist Edward Kemeys' 1881 sculpture of a crouching panther titled The Still Hunt, which sits atop a rock in New York City's Central Park, about half a mile southwest of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Large sculpted cats also feature in Diane Webster's "Lick of Wind,” which begins: "Two lion sculptures guard / the entrance. . . .” I suspect we're in New York City again, as that sounds like Patience and Fortitude, the famous marble lions who sit as sentinels on either side of the steps leading up to the New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue.

"Obsequies of an Egyptian Cat,” by Gail White, and “Bastet,” by Kristen McHenry, are about the cat-headed goddess of ancient Egyptian mythology. Poems by legendary poets Rainier Maria Rilke and Charles Baudelaire appear in the original German and French side-by-side with English translations by Susan McLean.

Purr and Yowl: An Anthology of Poetry About Cats is full of reminders of why so many of us are fascinated and enamored of felines. It's a perfect gift for the cat and / or poetry lover in your life.

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Steve Potter is the author of the novel Gangs With Greek Names, a short fiction collection called Easy Money & Other Stories, and two poetry collections: Mendacity Quirk Slipstream Snafu and Social Distance Sing. His poems, stories, and reviews have appeared in publications such as E·Ratio, Otoliths, Parole, and Word For/Word. Real Stand-Up Guys, the sequel to Gangs With Greek Names, is forthcoming.

Purr and Yowl: An Anthology of Poetry About Cats, Edited by David. D. Horowitz

ISBN: 978-1-936657-93-3
World Enough Writers
c/o Concrete Wolf
PO Box 2220, Newport, OR 97365-0163

WorldEnoughWriters@gmail.com
worldenoughwriters.com

2023, paperback, 258 pages, $24.99