Poems About Cats
Purrrr-ty Poems . . .
The reason for this page is simple. I love poetry and I love cats. Many poets have written about our feline friends and some are presented here in traditional and contemporary verse. Enjoy!
"Cats can work out mathematically the exact place to sit that will cause most inconvenience." ~ Pam Brown ~
The Cat and the Moon
by Wm. Butler Yeats
The cat went here and there
and the moon spun round like a top,
and the nearest kin of the moon,
the creeping cat, looked up.
Black Minnaloushe stared at the moon,
for, wander and wail as he would,
the pure cold light in the sky
troubled his animal blood.
Minnaloushe runs in the grass
lifting his delicate feet.
Do you dance, Minnaloushe, do you dance?
When two close kindred meet,
what better than call a dance?
Maybe the moon may learn,
tired of that courtly fashion,
a new dance turn.
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
from moonlit place to place,
the sacred moon overhead
has taken a new phase.
Does Minnaloushe know that his pupils
will pass from change to change,
and that from round to crescent,
from crescent to round they range?
Minnaloushe creeps through the grass
alone, important and wise,
and lifts to the changing moon
his changing eyes.
by Jim Howell
Cats...
have eyes that yawn,
green
as a halt sign.
In morse-tail
language
they speak your mind,
loving you
to fur-deep
distraction.
Let Sleeping Cats Lie
by William Cowper
A poet's cat, sedate and grave,
as poet would wish to have,
was much addicted to enquire,
for nooks to which she might retire,
and where, secure as mouse in chink,
she might repose, or sit and think.
I know not where she caught her trick,
nature perhaps herself had cast her,
in such a mold philosophique,
or else she learn'd it of her master.
Sometimes ascending, debonair,
an apple tree or lofty pear,
lodg'd with convenience in the fork,
she watched the gard'ner at his work;
sometimes her ease and solace sought,
in an old empty wat'ring pot,
there wanting nothing, save a fan,
to seem some nymph in her sedan,
apparell'd in exactest sort,
and ready to be borne in court.
art: Karadajuu / photobucket
The Cat of the House
by Ford Madox Ford
Over the hearth with my 'minishing eyes I muse; until after
the last coal dies.
Every tunnel of the mouse,
every channel of the cricket,
I have smelt,
I have felt
the secret shifting of the mouldered rafter,
and heard
every bird in the thicket.
I see
you
Nightingale up in the tree!
I, born of a race of strange things,
of deserts, great temples, great kings,
in the hot sands where the nightingale never sings!
The Monk and His Cat Pangur
by an Irish Monk, 18th cetury
I and my white Pangur
have each his special art:
His mind is set on hunting mice,
mine is upon my special craft.
I love to rest - better than any fame!
With close study at my little book;
White Pangur does not envy me:
He loves his childish play.
When in our house we two are all alone...
A tale without tedium.
We have - sport never-ending!
Something to exercise our wit.
At times by feats of derring-do
a mouse sticks in his net,
while into my net there drops
a difficult problem of hard meaning.
He points his full shining eye
against the fence of the wall:
I point my clear though feeble eye
against the keenness of science.
He rejoices with quick leaps
when in his sharp claw sticks a mouse;
I, too, rejoice when I have grasped
a problem difficult and dearly loved.
Though we are thus at all time,
neither hinders the other,
each of us pleased with his own art
amuses himself alone.
He is master of the work
which every day he does:
While I am at my own work
to bring difficulty to clearness.
