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Title: The Rubáiyát of a Persian Kitten

Author: Oliver Herford

Release date: January 12, 2008 [eBook #24258]

Language: English

Credits: Produced by David Edwards, Sam W. and the Online Distributed

Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was

produced from scanned images of public domain material

from the Google Print project.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RUBÁIYÁT OF A PERSIAN KITTEN ***

Front cover of The Rubaiyat of a Persian Kitten

The

Rubáiyát

of a

Persian Kitten

Oliver Herford

New York · Charles Scribner’s Sons

Mcmvi

The De Vinne Press.

The Rubáiyát of a

Persian Kitten

Wake! for the Golden Cat has put to flight

The Mouse of Darkness with his Paw of Light:

Which means, in Plain and simple every-day

Unoriental Speech—The Dawn is bright.

They say the Early Bird the Worm shall taste.

Then rise, O Kitten! Wherefore, sleeping, waste

The Fruits of Virtue? Quick! the Early Bird

Will soon be on the Flutter—O make haste!

The Early Bird has gone, and with him ta’en

The Early Worm—Alas! the Moral’s plain,

O Senseless Worm! Thus, thus we are repaid

For Early Rising—I shall doze again.

The Mouse makes merry ’mid the Larder Shelves,

The Bird for Dinner in the Garden delves.

I often wonder what the creatures eat

One half so toothsome as they are Themselves.

And that Inverted Bowl of Skyblue Delf

That helpless lies upon the Pantry Shelf—

Lift not your eyes to It for help, for It

Is quite as empty as you are yourself.

The kitten looks up at a bowl on the shelf

The Ball no question makes of Ayes or Noes,

But right or left, as strikes the Kitten, goes;

Yet why, altho’ I toss it Far Afield,

It still returneth—Goodness only knows!

A Secret Presence that my likeness feigns,

And yet, quicksilver-like, eludes my pains—

In vain I look for Him behind the glass;

He is not there, and yet He still remains.

A kitten peers round the edge of a mirror at its reflection

What out of airy Nothing to invoke

A senseless Something to resist the stroke

Of unpermitted Paw—upon the pain

Of Everlasting Penalties—if broke.

I sometimes think the Pussy-Willows grey

Are Angel Kittens who have lost their way,

And every Bulrush on the river bank

A Cat-Tail from some lovely Cat astray.

A willow twig covered with kittens instead of catkins

Sometimes I think perchance that Allah may,

When he created Cats, have thrown away

The Tails He marred in making, and they grew

To Cat-Tails and to Pussy-Willows grey.

And lately, when I was not Feeling Fit,

Bereft alike of Piety and Wit,

There came an Angel Shape and offered me

A Fragrant Plant and bid me taste of it.

A lady offers the kitten a sprig of catnip

’Twas that reviving Herb, that Spicy Weed,

The Cat-Nip. Tho’ ’tis good in time of need,

Ah, feed upon it lightly, for who knows

To what unlovely antics it may lead.

Strange—is it not?—that of the numbers who

Before me passed this Door of Darkness thro’,

Not one returns thro’ it again, altho’

Ofttimes I’ve waited here an hour or two.

A kitten peers into the top of a boot while mice scamper from a hole in the toe

’Tis but a Tent where takes his one Night’s Rest

A Rodent to the Realms of Death address’d,

When Cook, arising, looks for him and then—

Baits, and prepares it for another Guest.

A kitten watches a mouse caught under a basket trap

They say the Lion and the Lizard keep

The Courts where Jamshýd gloried and drank deep.

The Lion is my cousin; I don’t know

Who Jamshýd is—nor shall it break my sleep.

A kitten looks at a small statuette of a lion

Impotent glimpses of the Game displayed

Upon the Counter—temptingly arrayed;

Hither and thither moved or checked or weighed,

And one by one back in the Ice Chest laid.

A kitten sits outside a butcher's window, staring at the game on display

What if the Sole could fling the Ice aside,

And with me to some Area’s haven glide—

Were’t not a Shame, were’t not a shame for it

In this Cold Prison crippled to abide?

A kitten reaches for a fish in an icebox

Some for the Glories of the Sole, and Some

Mew for the proper Bowl of Milk to come.

Ah, take the Fish and let your Credit go,

And plead the rumble of an empty Tum.

One thing is certain: tho’ this Stolen Bite

Should be my last and Wrath consume me quite,

One taste of It within the Area caught

Better than at the Table lost outright.

The kitten, carrying the fish, sneaks away from the house

Indeed, indeed Repentance oft before

I swore, but was I hungry when I swore?

And then and then came Cook—with Hose in hand—

And drowned my glory in a sorry pour.

The kitten drops the fish and runs away from the spraying water

What without asking hither harried whence,

And without asking whither harried hence—

O, many a taste of that forbidden Sole

Must down the memory of that Insolence.

The soaked kitten looks sorry for itself

Heaven, but the vision of a Flowing Bowl;

And Hell, the sizzle of a Frying Sole

Heard in the hungry Darkness, where Myself,

So rudely cast, must impotently roll.

The kitten, outside the house, peers through the window at the warm fire

The Vine has a tough Fibre which about

While clings my Being;—let the Canine Flout

Till his Bass Voice be pitched to such loud key

It shall unlock the door I mew without.

A kitten climbs a tree to escape a barking dog

Up from the Basement to the Seventh Flat

I rose, and on the Crown of Fashion sat,

And many a Ball unravelled by the way—

But not the Master’s angry Bawl of “Scat!”

A kitten sits by a mirror, which shows the reflection of a man

Then to the Well of Wisdom I—and lo!

With my own Paw I wrought to make it flow,

And This was all the Harvest that I reaped:

We come like Kittens and like Cats we go.

A kitten reaches a paw towards an open ink bottle on a desk

Why be this Ink the Fount of Wit?—who dare

Blaspheme the glistening Pen-drink as a snare?

A Blessing?—I should spread it, should I not?

And if a Curse—why, then upset it!—there!

The kitten looks surprised as the ink bottle starts to tip over

A moment’s Halt, a momentary Taste

Of Bitter, and amid the Trickling Waste

I wrought strange shapes from Máh to Máhi, yet

I know not what I wrote, nor why they chased.

The kitten jumps out of the window, leaving behind a tipped over bottle and inky pawprints

Now I beyond the Pale am safely past.

O, but the long, long time their Rage shall last,

Which, tho’ they call to supper, I shall heed

As a Stone Cat should heed a Pebble cast.

The kitten looks behind at the inky pawprints on the wall

And that perverted Soul beneath the Sky

They call the Dog—Heed not his angry Cry;

Not all his Threats can make me budge one bit,

Nor all his Empty Bluster terrify.

A kitten sits on a wall looking down at a dog

They are no other than a moving Show

Of whirling Shadow Shapes that come and go

Me-ward thro’ Moon illumined Darkness hurled,

In midnight, by the Lodgers in the Row.

A kitten watches bottles, boots and other objects fall from above

Myself when young did eagerly frequent

The Backyard Fence and heard great Argument

About it, and About, yet evermore

Came out with Fewer Fur than in I went.

A kitten looks up, scared, at a larger cat sitting in front of it

Ah, me! if you and I could but conspire

To grasp this Sorry Scheme of things entire,

Would we not shatter it to bits, and then

Enfold it nearer to our Heart’s Desire?

The kitten and larger cat look at a tortoise

Tho’ Two and Two make Four by rule of line,

Or they make Twenty-two by Logic fine,

Of all the Figures one may fathom, I

Shall ne’er be floored by anything but Nine.

A kitten stares at a row of books, volumes 1 to 9, each with the word Life on the spine

And fear not lest Existence shut the Door

On You and Me, to open it no more.

The Cream of Life from out your Bowl shall pour

Nine times—ere it lie broken on the Floor.

An angel-kitten, with wings and halo, flies upwards

So, if the Fish you Steal—the Cream you drink—

Ends in what all begins and ends in, Think,

Unless the Stern Recorder points to Nine,

Tho’ They would drown you—still you shall not sink.

A kitten floats on the sea in a small round lifebelt

BOOKS BY OLIVER HERFORD

WITH PICTURES BY THE AUTHOR

PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS

THE BASHFUL EARTHQUAKE	$1.25
A CHILD’S PRIMER OF NATURAL HISTORY	$1.25
OVERHEARD IN A GARDEN	$1.25
MORE ANIMALS	net, $1.00
THE RUBAIYAT OF A PERSIAN KITTEN	net, $1.00
THE FAIRY GODMOTHER-IN-LAW	net, $1.00

Transcriber's Note

The unusual capitalisation is as it appears in the original text.

Advertising material has been moved to the end of the text.

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