White Cat

This poem was actually a sixth grade literature assignment that I kept. It was my first poem that really seemed worth showing people outside my family. I recently found it and decided to add it just for fun. Hope you enjoy!

White Cat 

a poem based off of Gertrude Abercrombie's painting: White Cat

            The marshmallow cat crouches in a corner

Of a rainy sky and ivory colored room

The artist’s sudden movement freezes the cat like an icicle

 head slightly turned from the opal dyed vase on the table.

 The cat’s eyes stare blankly at the artist

as she tries to capture the expression of the cat onto the canvas’s pale body

with one of her many assortments of brushes

 this one thick as a broom.

The artist then turns to recreate the portrait clinging on to the otherwise blank wall

with the last of its aged strength.

 Slightly blurring the animal shown in a paper thin coat of oily paint

 a twinkle in her eye bright as the sun,

shows it is up to the viewer to guess whether or not the snow colored animal

 is the same one in the portrait as in the room she has painted, or some other.

 Afterwards having already drawn three sides of the portraits frame

she allows her ivory paint to leap off the brush

smothering vivid lines of white to the right side of the frame.

  Though the cat’s stone gray shadow on the wall proves the sun to be smiling

the spectator still yet wonders

if this white area of frame is a reflection of light

or perhaps just a mismatching block of wood

placed by accident into the ancient frame

something of which with nobody cared to bother.

As if not to disturb the cat

the artist’s strong and graceful brush dances

more discreetly on the charcoal shadow lines of the door.

Could she not want to distract the cat

into turning towards her hand once again?

Has she not yet painted the solemn thing’s shadow

 therefore pleading silently

for it not to shift position, or scoot around the floor?

 The lines and patterns of the leaping brush cannot but help make you question the events occurring at the time of this painting.

Perhaps she intended this to be so?

 Can an artist not paint in such a manner purposely

 as if questioning the future reaction?

The artist smiles

and as if to show she is pleased with the picturesque painting

  signs her last name

 Abercrombie

 officially admitting the masterpiece her own handiwork ready for show.

The cat rustles loud as a herd of cattle

 and obediently the artist open the door

 as if to say “yes, your work is done,” while the relived cat leaps out the door

 and disappears into the skinny and dark hallway.