Emily Bilman, PhD is a poet-scholar who lives and writes Geneva, Switzerland. Her dissertation, The Psychodynamics of Poetry: Poetic Virtuality and Oedipal Sublimation in the Poetry of T.S. Eliot and Paul Valéry, with her poetry translations, was published by Lambert Academic in 2010 and Modern Ekphrasis in 2013 by Peter Lang, CH. Her poetry books, A Woman By A Well (2015), Resilience (2015), The Threshold of Broken Waters (2018), and Apperception (2020) were published by Troubador, UK. “The Tear-Catcher” won the first prize in depth poetry by The New York Literary Magazine. Poems were published in Deronda Review, The London Magazine, San Antonio Review, The Wisconsin Review, Expanded Field, Poetics Research, The Blue Nib, Tipton Poetry Journal, North of Oxford Journal, Otherwise Engaged Magazine, Literary Heist, The High Window, Wild Court, Remington Review, Book of Matches, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Poets Live Anthology 4, OxMag, San Diego Poetry Anthology, Contemporary Poetry 2022, Ballast Journal, Soren Lit, Southern Arizona Press Anthologies, Poetry Salzburg Review.
She blogs on her website. http://www.emiliebilman.wix.com/emily-bilman
My Feline Shadow
My cat’s tail twitches against my legs in content
As he follows my moods with his feline body.
My cat sprawls on the sculpted carpet
Nonchalantly as if he were an ethereal ghost.
When I write I try to keep the ghosts out but ghosts,
Like shadows, wander around without speech.
Sometimes, I find my cat beneath my desk,
Playing with the computer wires as if to connect
Me with all my friends. He has a big golden heart
Full of kindness reflected on his black button-nose
As he jounces with surprise or wiggles his tail
When he follows his own shadow or offers me
Silken scarves for play. Then, we regain our poise
Now as our shadows blend in sheer sunlight.
