One of my favourite books is Poetry for Cats – the Definitive Anthology of Distinguished Feline Verse by Henry Beard, a writer on National Lampoons (I believe) as well as the author of such titles as French for Cats and X-Treme Latin. It’s the ideal gift for anyone in your life who is fond of poetry. And, notwithstanding inasmuch as which, cats. Each entry is a pastiche of a well-known poem as if written by the poet’s cat. Here, for an example, is an extract from On First Looking into Clarke’s Larder by John Keats’s Cat-
Much have I traveled with the poet Keats
And many shabby homes and mansions seen;
‘Neath many meager tables have I been,
But never did I spy such scanty eats,
As when he went to hear Homeric feats
Read by a friend of his named Clarke, a dean.
My supper was a single small sardine.
You get the idea.
But I digress.
Last night I went to see a concert by a fine local band called Stealer, which does cover versions of all the hard rock that transfixed me as a teenager and a student, such as Deep Purple, Free, Queen, Jimi and the mighty Zep. A highlight was a rollicking version of Deep Purple’s Highway Star, a classic from the Machine Head album.
I didn’t get home ’til late, and this morning woke up rather woozy. This was cured by taking Canis primus croxorum and Canis secundus croxorum for an invigorating walk along the beach, during which time Highway Star was running through my head … though strangely transmuted … as if from a collection called Classic Rock for Dogs …
Nobody’s gonna steal my ball
I’m gonna chase it to the ground.
Nobody’s gonna steal my ball
It’s gonna break the speed of sound.
Ooooh, it’s a rolling machine
It’s got everything
Like flying speed, and stinky smells
And everything.
I love it – I need it – I feel it
Four furry paws, all of them mine
All right, hold tight
I’m a Highway Hound.
I’ll get me coat.
Though I’m a year older than Young Mr Crox, I have to say that I was a punk rocker in my late 70s adolescence rather than a fan of heavy rock. Though I did teach myself electric guitar playing the riff to Smoke on the Water, like practically everyone who ever picked up an electric guitar.
In my day, long ago admittedly, one of the local Norfolk bands of choice was the oddly named “Fly By Night Removals” – one of whom wore a hard hat on stage… A curious habit, but there we are… I wonder whatever happened to them?
Wonderful poem, Henry. And I’m tempted to get the Poetry for Cats Anthology – even though the person I live with has been known to shoot at them with air rifles.
Poetry for Cats is indeed a sublime example of kitty lit.
Most Excellent.
I am a bit young to be able to lay claim to Deep Purple as the music of my youth (at least, not the albums of their glory days), but I will happily cop to devouring them and other contemporary bands anyway. Fond memories of cranking Highway Star and all the rest of them, on glorious 12-inch vinyl.
Steve’s Music Store in Toronto used to have a sign up in their guitar department that said “no Smoke on the Water”. I like to think that the “No Stairway to Heaven” sign from Wayne’s World was based on this, Mike Myers being from this neck of the woods and well familiar with Steve’s.
“No Stairway! Denied!”
I have a feeling that the minstrelsy of wannabe guitarists in stores across the world has ever been so restricted, so Mike Myers could have gotten that notice from just about anywhere. I’m rather fond of the scene in Wayne’s World 2 in which the driver and passengers of Wayne’s car mime to Bohemian Rhapsody.
Digressively, when I subjected to my then girlfriend to a showing of This is Spinal Tap, her comment was that all the characters reminded her of all my friends. Reader, she married me.
Not that time has mellowed me – some weeks ago I chaired a meeting at the Zoological Society of London and was described in a well-known journal of record
as
How typical of that paper to get things wrong. The T-shirt had been clean on only that morning.
Treasure it, Henry. That kind of description in a journal of record is one we’d all like to have. The best I’ve managed (though not in print) was when one of my ex-HoDs described me publicly as a ‘barrack room lawyer’ and a “morale problem”.
Indeed. I wear it as a badge of ragged glory.