SELECT POETRY.

Tuapeka Times, Volume V, Issue 238, 22 August 1872, Page 9

SELECT POETRY.

SAD MEMORIES. They tell mo I'm beautiful : they praise my silken hair, My tittle feet that silently slip on from stair to 'They praise my pretty trustful face and innocent gray eye ; fond hands caress me oftentimes, yet would $hat I might die ! Why was I born to be abhorred of .nan and bird and beast? The bullfinch mules me stealing by, and straight his song hath ceased ; The shrewd mouse eyes me shuddering,' then flees ; and worse than that, The housedog he flees after me— why was "I born a cat ! Men prize the heartless hound who quits dryeyed his native land ; . Who wags a mercenary tail and licks a tyrant hand. . The leal 1 true cat they prize not, that if e'er compelled to roam Still flies,' when let out of the bag, precipitately home. .; They callme cruel. ■ Do I know if mouse of songbird feels? I only know that they make me light and salutary meals : And if, as 'tis my nature to, ere I devour I tease 'em, Why should a low-bred gardener's boy; pursue, me with a besom ? ' Should china fall or chandeliers, or any tiling hut stocks — Nay stocks, when they're in'flower-pots— the cat expects hard knocks : Should ever anything be missed— milk, coals, t umbrellas, brandy— - „, i cat's pitched into with a boot- or anything that's handy, member, I remember, how one night I 'jfleeted by, i gained the blessed tiles and gazed into the / cold clear sky. .remember, I remember, how my various lovers ' came ; /And there, beneath the crescent moon, played ' many a little game. They fought— by good St, Catherine, 'twas a fearsome sight to see The coal-black crest, the glowering orbs, of one gigantic He. Like bow by some tall bowman ben at Hastings or Poitiers, His huge back curved, till none obs6rved a vestige of his ears : He stood, an ebon crescent, flouting yon ivory moon ; Then, raised the pibroch of his race, the Song without a Tune : Gleamed his white teeth, his mammoth tail waved darkly to and fro, As with one complex yell he burst, all claws, upon the foe, It thrills me now, that final Miaow — that weird unearthly din : Lone maidens heard it far away nad leaped out of their skin. A potboy trom his den o'erhead peeped with a scared wan face ; Then sent a random brickbat down, which knocked me into space. Nine days I fell, or thereabouts : and, had we not nine lives, I wish I ne'er had seen again thy sausage-shop, St. lyes ! Had I, as some cats have, nine tails, how gladly I would lick The hand, and person generally, of him who heaved that brick ! For me they fill the milk-bowl up, and cnll the choice sardine : But ah ! I nevermore shall be the cat I once have been! The memoiies of that fatal night they haunt me even now : In dreams I see that rampant He, and tremble at. that Miaow.