Green Glass Beads Read online

  The Cat and the Moon

  The cat went here and there

  And the moon spun round like a top,

  And the nearest kin of the moon,

  The creeping cat, looked up.

  Black Minnaloushe stared at the moon,

  For, wander and wail as he would,

  The pure cold light in the sky

  Troubled his animal blood.

  Minnaloushe runs in the grass

  Lifting his delicate feet.

  Do you dance, Minnaloushe, do you dance?

  When two close kindred meet,

  What better than call a dance?

  Maybe the moon may learn,

  Tired of that courtly fashion,

  A new dance turn.

  Minnaloushe creeps through the grass

  From moonlit place to place,

  The sacred moon overhead

  Has taken a new phase.

  Does Minnaloushe know that his pupils

  Will pass from change to change,

  And that from round to crescent,

  From crescent to round they range?

  Minnaloushe creeps through the grass

  Alone, important and wise,

  And lifts to the changing moon

  His changing eyes.

  W. B. Yeats

  My Cat Jeoffry

  For I will consider my Cat Jeoffry.

  For he is the servant of the Living God, duly and daily serving him.

  For at the first glance of the glory of God in the East he worships in his way.

  For this is done by wreathing his body seven times round with elegant quickness.

  For then he leaps up to catch the musk, which is the blessing of God upon his prayer.

  For he rolls upon prank to work it in.

  For having done duty and received blessing he begins to consider himself.

  For this he performs in ten degrees.

  For first he looks upon his fore-paws to see if they are clean.

  For secondly he kicks up behind to clear away there.

  For thirdly he works it upon stretch with the fore-paws extended.

  For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.

  For fifthly he washes himself.

  For sixthly he rolls upon wash.

  For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.

  For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.

  For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.

  For tenthly he goes in quest of food.

  For having consider’d God and himself he will consider his neighbour.

  For if he meets another cat he will kiss her in kindness.

  For when he takes his prey he plays with it to give it chance.

  For one mouse in seven escapes by his dallying.

  For when his day’s work is done his business more properly begins.

  For he keeps the Lord’s watch in the night against the adversary.

  For he counteracts the powers of darkness by his electrical skin & glaring eyes.

  For he counteracts the Devil, who is death, by brisking about the life.

  For in his morning orisons he loves the sun and the sun loves him.

  For he is of the tribe of Tiger.

  For the Cherub Cat is a term of the Angel Tiger.

  For he has the subtlety and hissing of a serpent, which in goodness he suppresses.

  For he will not do destruction, if he is well-fed, neither will he spit without provocation.

  For he purrs in thankfulness, when God tells him he’s a good Cat.

  For he is an instrument for the children to learn benevolence upon.

  For every house is incompleat without him & a blessing is lacking in the spirit.

  Christopher Smart

  The Tyger

  Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

  In the forests of the night,

  What immortal hand or eye

  Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

  In what distant deeps or skies

  Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

  On what wings dare he aspire?

  What the hand dare seize the fire?

  And what shoulder, and what art,

  Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

  And when thy heart began to beat,

  What dread hand? and what dread feet?

  What the hammer? what the chain?

  In what furnace was thy brain?

  What the anvil? what dread grasp

  Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

  When the stars threw down their spears,

  And water’d heaven with their tears,

  Did he smile his work to see?

  Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

  Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

  In the forests of the night,

  What immortal hand or eye

  Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

  William Blake

  A Sonnet on a Monkey

  O lovely O most charming pug

  Thy graceful air and heavenly mug

  The beauties of his mind do shine

  And every bit is shaped so fine

  Your very tail is most divine

  Your teeth is whiter than the snow

  You are a great buck and a bow

  Your eyes are of so fine a shape

  More like a christians than an ape.

  His cheeks is like the roses blume

  Your hair is like the ravens plume

  His noses cast is of the roman

  He is a very pretty weoman

  I could not get a rhyme for roman

  And was obliged to call it weoman.

  Marjory Fleming

  The Cow

  The friendly cow, all red and white,

  I love with all my heart:

  She gives me cream with all her might,

  To eat with apple-tart.

  She wanders lowing here and there,

  And yet she cannot stray,

  All in the pleasant open air,

  The pleasant light of day;

  And blown by all the winds that pass

  And wet with all the showers,

  She walks among the meadow grass

  And eats the meadow flowers.

  Robert Louis Stevenson

  Cow

  The Cow comes home swinging

  Her udder and singing:

  ‘The dirt O the dirt

  It does me no hurt.

  And a good splash of muck

  Is a blessing of luck.

  O I splosh through the mud

  But the breath of my cud

  Is sweeter than silk.

  O I splush through manure

  But my heart stays pure

  As a pitcher of milk.’

  Ted Hughes

  The Blessing

  Just off the highway to Rochester, Minnesota,

  Twilight bounds softly forth on the grass.

  And the eyes of those two Indian ponies

  Darken with kindness.

  They have come gladly out of the willows

  To welcome my friend and me.

  We step over the barbed wire into the pasture

  Where they have been grazing all day, alone.

  They ripple tensely, they can hardly contain their happiness

  That we have come.

  They bow shyly as wet swans. They love each other.

  There is no loneliness like theirs.

  At home once more,

  They begin munching the young tufts of spring in the darkness.

  I would like to hold the slenderer one in my arms,

  For she has walked over to me

  And nuzzled my left hand.

  She is black and white,

  Her mane falls wild on her forehead,

  And the light breeze moves me to caress her long ear

  That is as delicate as the skin over a girl’s wrist.

  Suddenly I realize

  That if I stepped out of my body I woul