Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat,
Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes
Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes
Where China's gayest art had dyed
The azure flower~ that blow;
Demurest of the tabby kind,
The pensive Selima reclined,
Gazed on the lake below.
Her conscious tail her joy declared;
The fair round face, the snowy beard,
The velvet of her paws,
Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,
She saw; and purred applause.
Still had she gazed; but 'midst the tide
Two angel forms were seen to glide,
The genii of the stream:
Their sealy armour's Tyrian hue
Their sealy armour's Tyrian hue
Through richest purple to the view
Betrayed a golden gleam.
The hapless nymph with wonder saw:
A whisker first and then a claw,
With many an ardent wish,
She stretched in vain to reach the prize.
What female heart can gold despise ?
What cat's averse to fish?
Presumptuous maid! with looks intent
Again she stretched, again she bent,
Nor knew the gulf between.
Malignant Fate sat by and smiled
The slippery verge her feet beguiled,
She tumbled headlong in.
Eight times emerging from the flood
She mewed to every watery god,
Some speedy aid to send.
No dolphin came, no Nereid stirred;
Nor cruel Tom nor Susan heard.
A favourite has no friend!
From hence, ye beauties, undeceived,
Know, one false step is ne'er retrieved,
And be with caution bold.
Not all that tempts your wandering eyes
And heedless hearts is lawful prize.
Nor all that glisters, gold
Death of a Cat
Always fastidious, it removed its dying
From us, and lay down by it in the
dark
dark
As if death were a mouse, and a cat's
role
To deal with it, and not involve the
house;
Chose a remote spot that, when I bent
to help,
Shocked because it existed -I had
thought
The mind a complete map of home; left
dust
On my fingers when I had settled it
In front of the fire on an old
blanket;
Insisted to the last on standing
And walking with frail dignity to its
water
In its usual place in the kitchen,
disdaining
The saucer we had thoughtfully set
near it.
And death was a wind that tested
regularly
The strength the cat had left, and in
its
walk
walk
Puffed on its flank and made it
totter
Then courteously desisted. Death can
wait.
wait.
Powerless, with crude tears, we
watched the
cat
cat
Totter and reassert itself again and
again
Its life the fuel for its will to
live
Until the bones appeared, blood dried
in
veins,
veins,
The pelt was ragbag remnants, the
eyes gone
out
out
And the wind's task was easy and the
cat
fell.
fell.
