Not quite a mise-en-abîme, but close: Fannie's sitting on a book entitled "The Book." If only I could find a book about cats who sit upon books about cats who sit upon....
Someone who hissed at her doctor and me earlier enjoys the letters of Seraphim Rose, a grammar of Church Slavonic, and a documentary on St. John the Wonderworker. Apparently naughty kitties are still very pious.
“Ah Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits — and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire!”