The HyperTexts
The Best Animal Poems
This page contains some of the best animal poems of all time, and few of my own
(hopefully humorous) compositions. My favorite animal poem is "The Wild
Swans at Coole," an intensely beautiful word painting by the great Irish poet
William Butler Yeats. Other masterpieces include "The Death of a Toad" by Richard
Wilbur, "The Darkling Thrush" by Thomas Hardy,
"The Tyger" and "The Little Lamb" by William Blake, "The Fish" and "The
Armadillo" by Elizabeth Bishop, "Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell, and "Hurt
Hawks" by Robinson Jeffers. For readers who care about such things, I have
provided my admittedly highly subjective list of the greatest animal poems in
the English language, below.
by Michael R. Burch
Is this the world's ugliest animal ... or is it kinda cute, in a Ghostbusters ectoplasmic kind of way? It's called the Blobfish.
The Blobfish
by Michael R. Burch
You can call me a "blob"
with your oversized gob,
but what's your excuse,
great gargantuan Zeus
whose once-chiseled abs
are
now marbleized flab?
But what really alarms me
(how I wish you'd abstain)
is when you start using
that oversized "brain."
Consider the planet! Refrain!
My Top Twenty Animal Poems (most appear on this page)
(20) "The Hippopotamus"
by Hillaire Belloc
(19)
"The Turtle," "The Wasp," "The Guppy," "The Cow," "The Termite" and "The
Ostrich" by Ogden Nash
(18)
"The Snake" by D. H. Lawrence
(17)
"The Eagle" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
(16)
"Hope Is a Thing with Feathers," "Come Slowly Eden" and "I Heard a
Fly Buzz" by Emily Dickinson
(15) "A Blessing" by James Wright
(14)
"The Tyger" and "The Little Lamb" by William Blake
(13)
"The Badger" and "Mouse's Nest" by John Clare
(12)
"The Windhover" by Gerard Manley Hopkins
(11)
"Cold-Blooded Creatures"
and "The Eagle and the Mole" by Elinor Morton Wylie
(10)
"The Armadillo" and "The Fish" by Elizabeth Bishop
(9)
"Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell
(8)
"Hurt Hawks" by Robinson Jeffers
(7)
"The Hinds of the Field" passage from the Song of Solomon (King James Bible)
(6)
"The Most of It" by Robert Frost
(5)
"A Noiseless Patient Spider" by Walt Whitman
(4) "To a Mouse" and "To a Louse" by Robert Burns
(3)
"The Darkling Thrush" by Thomas Hardy
(2)
"The Death of a Toad" by Richard Wilbur
(1)
"The Wild Swans at Coole" and "Leda and the Swan" by William Butler Yeats
Honorable Mention: "The Bee" by Matsuo Basho, "No Droning Bee" and "The
Old Mare and the
Filly" by Sappho
The Hippopotamus
by Hillaire Belloc
I shoot the Hippopotamus
With bullets made of platinum,
Because if I use leaden ones
His hide is sure to flatten 'em.
Belloc's nonsense inspired this rejoinder of mine:
The Hippopotami
by Michael
R. Burch
There’s no seeing eye to eye
with the awesomely huge Hippopotami:
on the bank, you’re much taller;
going under, you’re smaller
and assuredly destined to die!
The Pelican
by ?
A wonderful bird is the pelican;
His beak can hold more than his belican.
He can hold in his beak
Enough food for a week,
Though I’m damned if I know how the helican!
There are a number of versions of the bit of oddball humor above. One version
begins with "A wondrous bird is the pelican," another with the questionable line
"A gorgeous bird is the pelican." Are pelicans gorgeous, really? Saner souls
soon settled on more believable adjectives. The earliest
version appeared in the Tampa Morning Tribune
on April 2, 1913 and was ascribed to C. M. Marshton, who said he had received it
from
relatives. When the Dixon Lanier Merritt version appeared in the Nashville
Banner on April 22, 1913, he claimed it was a "postcard poem" sent by a
gentleman's "best girl" in Clarksville. Col. Jeff McLemore was temporarily
given credit for writing the poem, but he too blamed it on some unknown person.
When LIFE magazine published yet another version of the poem, Merritt suggested that LIFE
should be blamed in retrospect! The jokes about disowning authorship are almost
as entertaining as the orphaned limerick!
I had to get in on the act, however belatedly:
Enough with this pitiful pelican!
He’s awkward and stinks! Sense his smellican!
His beak's far too big,
so he eats like a pig,
and his breath reeks of fish, I can tellican!
—Michael R. Burch
A Blessing
by James Wright
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 delicate as the skin over a girl's wrist.
Suddenly I realize
That if I stepped out of my body I would break
Into blossom.
Leda and the Swan
by William Butler Yeats
A sudden blow: the great wings beating still
Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed
By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,
He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.
How can those terrified vague fingers push
The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?
And how can body, laid in that white rush,
But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?
A shudder in the loins engenders there
The broken wall, the burning roof and tower
And Agamemnon dead.
Being so caught up,
So mastered by the brute blood of the air,
Did she put on his knowledge with his power
Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?
Come slowly, Eden
by Emily Dickinson
Come slowly—Eden
Lips unused to thee—
Bashful—sip thy jasmines—
As the fainting bee—
Reaching late his flower,
Round her chamber hums—
Counts his nectars—alights—
And is lost in balms!
Sappho, fragment 113
loose translation by
by Michael R. Burch
No droning bee,
nor even the bearer of honey
for me!
Sappho, fragment 35
loose translation by
by Michael R. Burch
Although you are very dear to me
you must marry a younger filly:
for I am far too old for you,
and this old mare is not that silly.
The Wild Swans at Coole
by William Butler Yeats
The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine and fifty swans.
The nineteenth Autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.
I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
All’s changed since I, hearing at twilight,
The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.
Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold,
Companionable streams or climb the air;
Their hearts have not grown old;
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.
But now they drift on the still water
Mysterious, beautiful;
Among what rushes will they build,
By what lake’s edge or pool
Delight men’s eyes, when I awake some day
To find they have flown away?
The Death of a Toad
by Richard Wilbur
A toad the power mower caught,
Chewed and clipped of a leg, with a hobbling hop has got
To the garden verge, and sanctuaried him
Under the cineraria leaves, in the shade
Of the ashen and heartshaped leaves, in a dim,
Low, and a final glade.
The rare original heartsblood goes,
Spends in the earthen hide, in the folds and wizenings, flows
In the gutters of the banked and staring eyes. He lies
As still as if he would return to stone,
And soundlessly attending, dies
Toward some deep monotone,
Toward misted and ebullient seas
And cooling shores, toward lost Amphibia's emperies.
Day dwindles, drowning and at length is gone
In the wide and antique eyes, which still appear
To watch, across the castrate lawn,
The haggard daylight steer.
A Noiseless Patient Spider
by Walt Whitman
A noiseless patient spider,
I mark'd where on a little promontory it stood isolated,
Mark'd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launch'd forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
And you O my soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.
The Most of It
by Robert Frost
He thought he kept the universe alone;
For all the voice in answer he could wake
Was but the mocking echo of his own
From some tree—hidden cliff across the lake.
Some morning from the boulder—broken beach
He would cry out on life, that what it wants
Is not its own love back in copy speech,
But counter—love, original response.
And nothing ever came of what he cried
Unless it was the embodiment that crashed
In the cliff's talus on the other side,
And then in the far distant water splashed,
But after a time allowed for it to swim,
Instead of proving human when it neared
And someone else additional to him,
As a great buck it powerfully appeared,
Pushing the crumpled water up ahead,
And landed pouring like a waterfall,
And stumbled through the rocks with horny tread,
And forced the underbrush—and that was all.
The Darkling Thrush
by Thomas Hardy
I leant upon a coppice gate
When Frost was spectre-gray,
And Winter's dregs made desolate
The weakening eye of day.
The tangled bine-stems scored the sky
Like strings of broken lyres,
And all mankind that haunted nigh
Had sought their household fires.
The land's sharp features seemed to be
The Century's corpse outleant,
His crypt the cloudy canopy,
The wind his death-lament.
The ancient pulse of germ and birth
Was shrunken hard and dry,
And every spirit upon earth
Seemed fervourless as I.
At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of joy illimited;
An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,
Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.
So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,
That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.
The Tyger
by William Blake
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, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & 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?
The Eagle and the Mole
by Elinor Morton Wylie
Avoid the reeking herd,
Shun the polluted flock,
Live like that stoic bird,
The eagle of the rock.
The huddled warmth of crowds
Begets and fosters hate;
He keeps above the clouds
His cliff inviolate.
When flocks are folded warm,
And herds to shelter run,
He sails above the storm,
He stares into the sun.
If in the eagle's track
Your sinews cannot leap,
Avoid the lathered pack,
Turn from the steaming sheep.
If you would keep your soul
From spotted sight or sound,
Live like the velvet mole:
Go burrow underground.
And there hold intercourse
With roots of trees and stones,
With rivers at their source,
And disembodied bones.
A friend of the great Scottish poet Robert Burns explains how he came to immortalize a lowly field mouse: "This beautiful poem was imagined while the poet was
holding the plough, on the farm of Mossgiel: the field is still pointed out, and
a man called Blane is still living, who says he was gaudsman to the bard at the
time, and chased the mouse with the plough-pettle, for which he was rebuked by
his young master, who inquired what harm the poor mouse had done him. In the
night that followed, Burns awoke his gaudsman, who was in the same bed with him,
recited the poem as it now stands, and said, 'What think you of our mouse now?'"
To a Mouse
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by
Michael R. Burch
Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim'rous beastie, Sleek, tiny, timorous, cowering
beast,
O, what panic's in thy breastie! why's such panic in your
breast?
Thou need na start awa sae hasty, Why dash away, so
quick, so rash,
Wi'
bickering brattle! in a frenzied flash
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee, when
I would be loath to run
after you
Wi' murd'ring pattle! with a murderous plowstaff!
I'm truly sorry Man's dominion I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union, has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion, and justifies that bad
opinion
Which makes thee startle, which makes you startle,
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion, when I'm your poor, earth-born
companion
An' fellow-mortal! and fellow mortal!
I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve; I have no doubt you sometimes
thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live! What of it, friend? You too must live!
A daimen-icker in a thrave A random corn-ear in a shock's
'S a sma' request: a small behest; it-
I'll get a blessin wi' the lave, 'll give me a blessing to
know such a loss;
An' never miss't! I'll never miss it!
Thy wee-bit housie, too, in ruin! Your tiny house lies in a ruin,
It's silly wa's the win's are strewin! its fragile walls wind-rent
and strewn!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane, Now nothing's left to construct you
a new one
O' foggage green! of mosses green
An' bleak December's winds ensuin, since bleak December's winds, ensuing,
Baith snell an' keen! blow
fast and keen!
Thou saw the fields laid bare an' wast, You saw your fields laid bare and
waste
An' weary Winter comin fast, with weary winter closing fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast, and cozy here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell, you thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter past till crash! the cruel iron
ploughshare passed
Out thro' thy cell. straight through your
cell!
That wee-bit heap o' leaves an' stibble, That flimsy heap of leaves and
stubble
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble! had cost you many a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble, Now you're turned out, for all your
trouble,
But house or hald. less house and hold,
To thole the Winter's sleety dribble, to endure cold winter's icy dribble
An' cranreuch cauld! and hoarfrosts cold!
But Mousie, thou are no thy-lane, But mouse-friend, you are not alone
In proving foresight may be vain: in proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o' Mice an' Men, the best-laid schemes of Mice and Men
Gang aft agley, go oft awry,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, and leave us only grief and pain,
For promis'd joy! for promised joy!
Still, thou art blest, compar'd wi' me! Still, friend, you're blessed
compared with me!
The present only toucheth thee: Only
present dangers make you flee:
But Och! I backward cast my e'e, But, ouch!, behind me I can see
On prospects drear! grim prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see, While forward-looking seers, we
I guess an' fear! humans guess and fear!
One Sunday while sitting behind a young lady in church,
Robert Burns noticed a louse roaming through the bows and ribbons of her bonnet. The poem "To a Louse" resulted from his observations. The poor woman had no idea that she would be the
subject of one of Burns' best poems about how we see ourselves, compared to how other
people see us at our worst moments.
To a Louse
by Robert Burns
modern English translation by
Michael R. Burch
Ha! Whare ye gaun, ye crowlin ferlie? Hey! Where're you going, you crawling hair-fly?
Your impudence protects you sairly,
Your
impudence protects you, barely;
I canna say but ye strut rarely I can only say that you swagger rarely
Owre gauze and lace, Over gauze and lace.
Tho' faith! I fear ye dine but sparely
Though faith! I fear you dine but sparely
On sic a place. In such a place.
Ye ugly, creepin, blastit wonner, You ugly, creeping, blasted wonder,
Detested, shunn'd by saunt an' sinner,
Detested, shunned by both saint and sinner,
How daur ye set your fit upon her—
How
dare you set your feet upon her—
Sae fine a lady! So fine a lady!
Gae somewhere else and seek your dinner Go somewhere else to seek your dinner
On some poor body. On some poor body.
Swith! in some beggar's hauffet squattle: Off! around some beggar's temple shamble:
There you may creep, and sprawl, and sprattle There you may creep, and sprawl, and scramble,
Wi' ither kindred, jumping cattle,
With other kindred, jumping cattle,
In shoals and nations; In shoals and nations;
Whare horn nor bane ne'er daur unsettle Where horn nor bone never dare unsettle
Your thick plantations. Your thick plantations.
Now haud you there! ye're out o' sight, Now hold you there! You're out of sight,
Below the fatt'rils, snug an' tight;
Below the folderols, snug and tight;
Na, faith ye yet! ye'll no be right, No, faith just yet! You'll not be right,
Till ye've got on it—
Till you've got on it:
The vera tapmost, tow'ring height The very topmost, towering height
O' miss's bonnet. Of miss's bonnet.
My sooth! right bauld ye set your nose out My word! right bold you root, contrary,
As plump an' grey as onie grozet: As plump and gray as any gooseberry.
O for some rank, mercurial rozet, Oh, for some rank, mercurial resin,
Or fell, red smeddum, Or dread red poison;
I'd gie ye sic a hearty dose o't, I'd give you such a hearty dose, flea,
Wad dress your droddum! It'd dress your noggin!
I wad na been surpris'd to spy I wouldn't be surprised to spy
You on an auld wife's flainen toy: You on some housewife's flannel tie:
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy, Or maybe on some ragged boy's
On's wyliecoat;
Pale undervest;
But Miss's fine Lunardi! fye! But Miss's finest bonnet! Fie!
How daur ye do't. How dare you jest?
O Jenny, dinna toss your head, Oh Jenny, do not toss your head,
An' set your beauties a' abread! And lash your lovely braids abroad!
You little ken what cursed speed You hardly know what cursed speed
The blastie's makin! The creature's making!
Thae winks an' finger-ends, I dread, Those winks and finger-ends, I dread,
Are notice takin'! Are notice-taking!
O wad some Power the giftie gie us O would some Power with vision teach us
To see oursels as ithers see us! To see ourselves as
others see us!
It wad frae monie a blunder free us,
It would from many a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion: And foolish notions:
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
What airs in dress and carriage would leave us,
An' ev'n devotion! And even devotion!
Mouse's Nest
by John Clare
I found a ball of grass among the hay
And progged it as I passed and went away;
And when I looked I fancied something stirred,
And turned again and hoped to catch the bird —
When out an old mouse bolted in the wheats
With all her young ones hanging at her teats;
She looked so odd and so grotesque to me,
I ran and wondered what the thing could be,
And pushed the knapweed bunches where I stood;
Then the mouse hurried from the craking brood.
The young ones squeaked, and as I went away
She found her nest again among the hay.
The water o'er the pebbles scarce could run
And broad old cesspools glittered in the sun.
The Windhover
by Gerard Manley Hopkins
I caught this morning morning's minion, king-
dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird,—the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!
Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!
No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.
Cold-Blooded Creatures
by Elinor Morton Wylie
Man, the egregious egoist
(In mystery the twig is bent)
Imagines, by some mental twist,
That he alone is sentient
Of the intolerable load
That on all living creatures lies,
Nor stoops to pity in the toad
The speechless sorrow of his eyes.
He asks no questions of the snake,
Nor plumbs the phosphorescent gloom
Where lidless fishes, broad awake,
Swim staring at a nightmare doom.
The Fish
by Elizabeth Bishop
I caught a tremendous fish
and held him beside the boat
half out of water, with my hook
fast in a corner of his mouth.
He didn't fight.
He hadn't fought at all.
He hung a grunting weight,
battered and venerable
and homely. Here and there
his brown skin hung in strips
like ancient wallpaper,
and its pattern of darker brown
was like wallpaper:
shapes like full-blown roses
stained and lost through age.
He was speckled with barnacles,
fine rosettes of lime,
and infested
with tiny white sea-lice,
and underneath two or three
rags of green weed hung down.
While his gills were breathing in
the terrible oxygen
—the frightening gills,
fresh and crisp with blood,
that can cut so badly—
I thought of the coarse white flesh
packed in like feathers,
the big bones and the little bones,
the dramatic reds and blacks
of his shiny entrails,
and the pink swim-bladder
like a big peony.
I looked into his eyes
which were far larger than mine
but shallower, and yellowed,
the irises backed and packed
with tarnished tinfoil
seen through the lenses
of old scratched isinglass.
They shifted a little, but not
to return my stare.
—It was more like the tipping
of an object toward the light.
I admired his sullen face,
the mechanism of his jaw,
and then I saw
that from his lower lip
—if you could call it a lip
grim, wet, and weaponlike,
hung five old pieces of fish-line,
or four and a wire leader
with the swivel still attached,
with all their five big hooks
grown firmly in his mouth.
A green line, frayed at the end
where he broke it, two heavier lines,
and a fine black thread
still crimped from the strain and snap
when it broke and he got away.
Like medals with their ribbons
frayed and wavering,
a five-haired beard of wisdom
trailing from his aching jaw.
I stared and stared
and victory filled up
the little rented boat,
from the pool of bilge
where oil had spread a rainbow
around the rusted engine
to the bailer rusted orange,
the sun-cracked thwarts,
the oarlocks on their strings,
the gunnels—until everything
was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!
And I let the fish go.
The Armadillo
by Elizabeth Bishop
for Robert Lowell
This is the time of year
when almost every night
the frail, illegal fire balloons appear.
Climbing the mountain height,
rising toward a saint
still honored in these parts,
the paper chambers flush and fill with light
that comes and goes, like hearts.
Once up against the sky it's hard
to tell them from the stars —
planets, that is — the tinted ones:
Venus going down, or Mars,
or the pale green one. With a wind,
they flare and falter, wobble and toss;
but if it's still they steer between
the kite sticks of the Southern Cross,
receding, dwindling, solemnly
and steadily forsaking us,
or, in the downdraft from a peak,
suddenly turning dangerous.
Last night another big one fell.
It splattered like an egg of fire
against the cliff behind the house.
The flame ran down. We saw the pair
of owls who nest there flying up
and up, their whirling black-and-white
stained bright pink underneath, until
they shrieked up out of sight.
The ancient owls' nest must have burned.
Hastily, all alone,
a glistening armadillo left the scene,
rose-flecked, head down, tail down,
and then a baby rabbit jumped out,
short-eared, to our surprise.
So soft! — a handful of intangible ash
with fixed, ignited eyes.
Too pretty, dreamlike mimicry!
O falling fire and piercing cry
and panic, and a weak mailed fist
clenched ignorant against the sky!
Hope Is a Thing with Feathers
by Emily Dickinson
Hope is a thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings a tune without words
And never stops at all.
And sweetest, in the gale, is heard
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That keeps so many warm.
I’ve heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea
Yet, never, in extremity
It ask a crumb of me.
Honeymoon Not-So-Sweet, or, Clyde Lied
by Michael
R. Burch
There once was a mockingbird, Clyde,
who bragged of his prowess, but lied.
To his new wife he sighed,
"When again, gentle bride?"
"Nevermore!" bright-eyed Raven replied.
The Mallard
by Michael R. Burch
The mallard is a fellow
whose lips are long and yellow
with which he, honking, kisses
his bawdy, boisterous mistress;
my pond’s their loud bordello!
The Platypus
by Michael R. Burch
The platypus, myopic,
is ungainly, not erotic.
His feet for bed
are over-webbed,
and what of his proboscis?
The platypus, though, is eager
although his means are meager.
His sight is poor;
perhaps he’ll score
with a passing duck or beaver.
The Dromedary and the Very Wary Canary
by Michael R. Burch
There once was a dromedary
who befriended a crafty canary.
Budgie said, “You can’t sing,
but, now, here’s the thing:
just think of the tunes you can carry!
The Sinister Snail
by Michael R. Burch
A sinister sinistral snail
went dextral, to no avail,
spent a week (here's a zinger)
as a right-winger,
but the leftist's now back in jail!
The Trouble with Elephants: a Word to the Wise
by Michael R. Burch
An elephant never forgets
and thus they don’t make the best pets:
Jumbo may well out-live you,
but he’ll never forgive you,
no matter how sincere your regrets!
A much-needed screed against licentious insects
by Michael
R. Burch
after and apologies to Robert Schechter
Army ants? ARMY ants?
Yet so undisciplined to not wear pants?
How incredibly rude
to wage war in the nude!
We moralists call them SMARMY ants!
The Flu Fly Flew
by Michael R. Burch
A fly with the flu foully flew
up my nose—thought I’d die—had to sue!
Was the small villain fined?
An abrupt judge declined
my case, since I’d “failed to achoo!”
The Bee
by Matsuo Basho
Having sucked deep
In a sweet peony,
A bee creeps
Out of its hairy recesses.
"The Hinds of the Field" passage from the Song of Solomon (King James Bible)
attributed to King Solomon
I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.
As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters.
As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons.
I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love.
Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples: for I am sick of love.
His left hand is under my head, and his right hand doth embrace me.
I charge you, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes,
and by the hinds of the field, that ye stir not up, nor wake my love, till he please.
The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills.
My beloved is like a roe or a young hart: behold, he standeth behind our wall,
he looketh forth at the windows, shewing himself through the lattice.
My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.
For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;
The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come,
and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land;
The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.
Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.
O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance,
let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance is comely.
Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes.
My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies.
Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved,
and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.
The Guppy
by Ogden Nash
Whales have calves,
Cats have kittens,
Bears have cubs,
Bats have bittens,
Swans have cygnets,
Seals have puppies,
But guppies just have little guppies.
The Cow
by Ogden Nash
The cow is of the bovine ilk;
One end is moo, the other, milk.
The Ostrich
by Ogden Nash
The ostrich roams the great Sahara.
Its mouth is wide, its neck is narra.
It has such long and lofty legs,
I'm glad it sits to lay its eggs.
The Termite
by Ogden Nash
Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good!
And that is why your Cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.
The Turtle
by Ogden Nash
The turtle lives 'twixt plated decks
Which practically conceal its sex.
I think it clever of the turtle
In such a fix to be so fertile.
The Wasp
by Ogden Nash
The wasp and all his numerous family
I look upon as a major calamity.
He throws open his nest with prodigality,
But I distrust his waspitality.
Christopher Smart's "Jubilate Agno" is a 1200-line poem that the poet wrote while institutionalized, about his cat Jeoffry.
The poem is too long for my purposes here, but it begins ...
Jubilate Agno
by Christopher Smart
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 is this 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 forepaws 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 forepaws 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 considered God and himself he will consider his neighbor.
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 a 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 and 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.
Related Pages: The
Cosmological Constant: Limericks by Michael R. Burch
The HyperTexts