I am very far behind my book goal for the year so far, so I did some TBR triage by moving shorter books up to the front of the request queue with my library. Poets Square is one of the first of that reshuffle to make its way to me and was a welcome bit of solace this past weekend.
Poets Square is Courtney Gustafson’s story of how she accidentally inherited a feral colony of 30 cats which in turn led her to work in community organizing and TNR (trap, neuter, release) work. This could have been a book about how Gustafson’s on the whim decision to chronicle the thirty cats she shared her driveway with on social media impacted her life on a cursory level, and I would have been glad to read it and given it 3 stars. But Gustafson digs much deeper and leans into what a memoir is meant to do.
Because really this lovely story about cats and how we love them is about people and how we can love them in community. Most of the lessons that Gustafson learns in her work with feral cats are about the people and systems that cause a feral colony and the ones taking care of it. In quick but descriptive prose Gustafson tells us how this work has helped her by showing how it helps others, and how easily one act of care can turn into dozens.
And for that I am grateful to have read this and am rating it 4 stars.
