My guide to cat poetry and verse

My special favourite is this one by T S Eliot - he certainly understood cats! He was apparently an US-born British poet and dramatist ... I'm not sure I understand that but anyway ... here's my favourite bit of verse, clearly written with me in mind as I'm never there either when 'someone' has done something naughty!

Macavity, Macavity, there's no one like Macavity
There never was a Cat of such deceitfulness and sauvity
He always has an alibi, and one or two to spare
At whatever time the deed took place -
MACAVITY WAS'NT THERE!

What about this one from a French chap called Michel de Montaigne? By the by, the humans are always off to France on booze cruises - normally followed by them wandering around looking green. Not sure it is somewhere I want to go - I much prefer being my smart ginger colour!! Anyway, I digress, here's what he had to say ...

When I play with my cat, who knows whether she is not amusing herself with me more than I with her.

I quite like this one by Samuel Johnson, the British writer, which shows his understanding of the golden rule that however scruffy someone's cat is that it must be praised as if the best cat ever. Not an issue with me, of course, as I am the best cat ever!

When I observed he was a fine cat, saying, 'why yes, Sir, but I have had cats whom I liked better than this'; and then as if perceiving Hodge to be out of countenance, adding, 'but he is a very fine cat, a very fine cat indeed.'

Hodge obviously got himself quite well know because someone called Sarah Chauncy Woolsey (Susan Coolidge) wrote a long poem about him! Here's a bit of it ...

Hodge, the Cat (an excerpt)

Burly and big, his books among,
Good Samuel Johnson sat,
With frowning brows and wig askew,
His snuff-strewn waistcoat far from new;
So stern and menacing his air,
That neither Black Sam,
nor the maid
To knock or interrupt him dare;
Yet close beside him, unafraid,
Sat Hodge, the cat.

"This participle," the Doctor wrote,
"The modern scholar cavils at,
But," - even as he penned the word,
A soft, protesting note was heard;
The Doctor fumbled with his pen,
The dawning thought took wings and flew,
The sound repeated, come again,
It was a faint, reminding "Mew!"
From Hodge, the cat...

The Dictionary was laid down,
The Doctor tied his vast cravat,
And down the buzzing street he strode,
Taking an often-trodden road,
And halted at a well-known stall:
"Fishmonger," spoke the Doctor gruff,
"Give me six oysters, that is all;
Hodge knows when he has had enough,
Hodge is my cat."

Then home; puss dined and while in sleep
he chased a visionary rat,
His master sat him down again,
Rewrote his page, renibbed his pen;
Each "i" was dotted, each "t" was crossed,
He labored on for all to read,
Nor deemed that time was waste or lost
Spent in supplying the small need
Of Hodge, the cat.

The dear old Doctor! Fierce of mien,
Untidy, arbitrary, fat,
What gentle thought his name enfold!
So generous of his scanty gold.
So quick to love, so hot to scorn,
Kind to all sufferers under heaven,
A tend'rer despot ne'er was born;
His big heart held a corner, even
For Hodge, the cat.

I've never had a poem written about me yet but who knows, one of these days ...hint, hint ...