His time he used to pass Writing sonnets, on the grass— (I _might_ say something good on _pen_ and _sward_!) While the cat sat near at hand, Trying hard to understand The poems he occasionally roared. (I myself possess a feline, But when poetry I roar He is sure to make a bee-line For the door.) The poet, cent by cent, All his patrimony spent— (I _might_ tell how he went from _verse_ to _worse_!) Till the cat was sure she could, By advising, do him good. So addressed him in a manner that was terse: “We are bound toward the scuppers, And the time has come to act, Or we’ll both be on our uppers For a fact!” On her boot she fixed her eye, But the boot made no reply— (I _might_ say: “Couldn’t speak to save its _sole_!”) And the foolish bard, instead Of responding, only read A verse that wasn’t bad upon the whole. And it pleased the cat so greatly, Though she knew not what it meant, That I’ll quote approximately How it went:— “If I should live to be The last leaf upon the tree”— (I _might_ put in: “I think I’d just as _leaf_!”) “Let them smile, as I do now, At the old forsaken bough”— Well, he’d plagiarized it bodily, in brief! But that cat of simple breeding Couldn’t read the lines between, So she took it to a leading Magazine. She was jarred and very sore When they showed her to the door. (I _might_ hit off the _door_ that was a _jar_!) To the spot she swift returned Where the poet sighed and yearned, And she told him that he’d gone a little far. “Your performance with this rhyme has Made me absolutely sick,” She remarked. “I think the time has Come to kick!” I could fill up half the page With descriptions of her rage— (I _might_ say that she went a bit _too fur_)! When he smiled and murmured: “Shoo!” “There is one thing I can do!” She answered with a wrathful kind of purr. “You may shoo me, an’ it suit you, But I feel my conscience bid Me, as tit for tat, to boot you!” (Which she did.) _The Moral_ of the plot (Though I say it, as should not!) Is: An editor is difficult to suit. But again there’re other times When the man who fashions rhymes Is a rascal, and a bully one to boot! _H. H. Knibbs_