The Cat's Pajamas

And here stalks Melville, Rudyard Kipling too.

Whale’s Herman’s White, Kim’s scribe an Indian hue,

Lord Russell, wily midget, now entrains

His top hat jumbo-size, to cup his brains

And challenge Shaw and Chesterton to chats

While Poe, subsided, scowling, frets their hats

To mend their politics or bend each mind

While steaming Kipling’s Country of the Blind.

Ah, hark! Their talk is gold and seldom tin

And boring? Never! God prevent that sin!

Muse hone their tongues to razor-sharpened wits

So Shaw can rave while proud Lord Russell sits

And I the modest mouse who locks his lip

And mutters not a mote along the trip,

Most gladly hidden—tucked between these brains

That locomote the night with idea trains,

Each locked to each and each a brighter car

And this a nova, that old Halley’s star,

A light-year comet blazed across our sight.

To teach our railway schools throughout our night.

Their philosophic crumbs I snatch and eat,

The hiccoughing of Shaw? my God, a treat!

While Poe grows quieter the more they storm,

His snowy moon brow pale, his tongue lukewarm,

But I am glad for him, for while they range

Poe’s eyes with mine do some wry joke exchange,

I see the Black Cat hid where Poe’

s seams split

His head a Pendulum, his breast a Pit,

While all about our favorite authors drink