From Eden to Today: The History of Cats and Humans in 14 Lines
for Mary Stephens
The feline is behind every motivation
in history. In the Book of Genesis,
in the early versions before P and J,
a cat, not a serpent, offered the apple.
Of course, it did not hiss but purred to Eve
its temptations, and crawled around her legs,
and sat on her belly when she tried to sleep,
and when Eve finally conceded to eat,
the cat, of course, walked away with raised nose
and rescinded offer. Eve followed
with begs and pleas. It turned into a game
of six days, until, well, you know the rest –
the long history of humanity
to the internet with cats on every site.
Tom Holmes is the founding editor of Redactions: Poetry & Poetics, and author of seven collections of poetry, most recently The Cave, which won The Bitter Oleander Press Library of Poetry Book Award for 2013. His writings about wine, poetry book reviews, and poetry can be found at his blog, The Line Break.