Richard Vallance
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Vallance Review 49. September 2005 Kitty Cat Sonnets
Click the sound button to listen to a piano
Jazz rendition of "Kitten on the Keys".
MEOW!
Hey, all you kitties out there! Hi, my name's Argentée ("Silvery" in English), and I'm Richard Vallance's Maine Coon [1]. Boy, are you ever in for a caterwauling surprise! Meow, me, myself and we, Our Majesty, are = am scrawling and scratching the Vallance Review this month, instead of our run-of-the-mill human critic, Richard Vallance. Now, if this sounds really hairy to you, well, you shouldn’t be the least bit surprised. Who else but a cat is best qualified to review sonnets and poems about cats? Ahem! As if... Grrr. After all, two years ago to the month, the ubiquitous Potato of Terror unearthed his (or her, as the case may be) too too earthy review, Potatoes, Sonnets and the Enormous Muse in Vallance Review, September 2003. That got plenty of laughs. Not to imply that this serious minded feline review will elicit anything like the same level of laughter, for who in his or her right mind would laugh at us cats? Nobody, of course. Rest assured that you humans are about to be furrily enlightened by us keen sighted puddy tats.
Of course, as a particularly witty kitty, now I ask you, why on earth (or in a tree, as the case may be?) would anyone in her right feline mind want to scratch out a review about human poets writing sonnets? Don't they have anything better to do, say, like, demanding to be fed Whiskas, fresh chicken and salmon and silky cat's milk right now ? -
or flinging the cat litter out of your litter box all over the place with as much drama as you kittily can to let your human know it's dirty and you want it cleaned...
or sleeping in the middle of the front hallway so no human can get in and out without tripping all over his or oafy feet
or even better, snoozing in the middle of the stairs so you humans have to hop over us like poor ungainly elephants (poor souls!)
or climbing trees and refusing to get down without growling and hissing ominously, just to scare the wits out of you confused humans
or sleeping on top of the kitchen cupboards way out of sight and not answering your human even though he desperately calls for you over and over and over again, and goes out of his mind (wrongly) thinking you're lost. Such furry fun!
or caterwauling for hours on end because you're a female like me and in heat and it's just plain fun to drive humans bananas who are trying to sleep
or hunting for bugs, birds and mice and anything else jaw smacking delicious
or purring so seductively your two legged can opener just itches to pet and cuddle and spoil you, at least until you get downright sick of it and just wander off in a fluffy huff, like, like, yadda yadda yadda. Purrrrrr (or fffft).
Now we all know why the ancient Egyptians worshipped us cats. Their priests allowed us to roam unfettered through their spacious temples, like the Great Temple at Karnak. And no wonder, we need lots of territory. Why on earth humans forgot to worship us after that is beyond me, but trust me, one day you'll all wisen up and worship us again. While most people in the Middle Ages detested us and branded us as witches, killing us off in droves, the results were predictable and oh so tragic. Because we cats killed rats, and rats were the carriers of the Great Plague, everyone knows what happened when those unenlightened humans killed us off. They were slaughtered by the plague, and in far greater numbers. Lesson learned, we sincerely hope so. However, there were a few notable exceptions to that blockheaded superstitious witchcraft rule. Francesco Petrarch, that paragon of the Italian Renaissance ( a true rebirth if there ever was one), loved his cat second only to his beloved Laura. Well, no one's perfect. The poor bloke got it the wrong way around. Just think how much more celebrated his Canzoniere would have been, had he written of his smitten love for his darling kitten. History is the poorer for it.
Anyways, as I was meowing, I fully intend to scrawl my impressions all over this page about some psychologically quirky modern day human sonnets. Perhaps the most naive and fluff headed of these sonneteers is none other than my own human slave, Richard Vallance, who imagines himself to be a poet, whatever THAT'S supposed to be. Whatever a poet IS (and your guess is as good as mine, my fine, furry-tailed friends) there seems to be no rhyme or reason whatsoever about the profession or the stuff poets write, called (would you believe it?) “poetry”. Here's at least one definition of poetry we cats may indeed deign to approve of:
Likewise, the terms vers de société and "light verse" have sometimes been used synonymously with "humorous poetry" to denote a type of writing lacking both seriousness and significant aesthetic value. [3]
Fortunately for us kitties, any poetry about us cannot conceivably be vers de société or light verse; so that means, to wit, that any poems about cats are highly serious and display significant aesthetic value. Go figure, eh? Have you ever met a cat who isn't significantly beautiful? I mean, get real! What did John Keats have to admit? “A kitty of beauty is a joy forever.”... or something of that ilk.
Thank heavens for small graces. Be it as it may, I will grant that human poetry is nice, I suppose, if you're into that sort of thing, but really, kitties, don't you all agree that our splendid caterwauling choruses, which keep whole neighbourhoods awake and on tenterhooks all night long, especially in winter, are far more entertaining?
So let's plug our poor sensitive ears (we hear 4 times better than you poor tone deaf humans) and sally forth to purrview some sonnets by a few folks we own.
Let's Purrview Some Human Sonnets
Well, as I was meowing before, right after my slave human, Richard Vallance, had the nerve to wake me up when I was catnapping, he scribbled off this peculiar sonnet, which leaves me almost meowless:
A Feline's UFOs [4]
Imagine Earth attacked by UFOs!
Their fleet is so belligerent and vast,
fierce as Klingons (or so the story goes),
it leaves defeated planets all aghast.
Imagine them traversing parsecs first,
as they take aim to crush a quaking Earth
in their own insatiable bloodlust's thirst
to drain us of resources for their worth.
Imagine that a trillion saucers land,
intent on wreaking havoc where they will,
their lasers aimed to blast us on command,
in spite of any government's good will. *
They land in white saucers. Imagine that.
The whole shebang gets lapped up by a cat.
© by Richard Vallance 2004
Now, against my better feline judgement, whiskers and tail alike a'bristle, I have quoted this bizarre little ditty of a human sonnet in its entirety, merely to illustrate one very obvious point of the claws. It seems to me that the most memorable lines of this otherwise unmemorable sonnet worth remembering at all are the last two verses, which humans call (for some strange reason) a “rhyming couplet”. Odd, that, considering that to us cats a rhyming couplet is caterwauling during mating, if you'll pardon my incisors for being so sharp.
Still, I must admit I do like those last two lines, because who in his or her right feline mind would not want to lap right up a nice fresh, cool bowl of milk, even if it does taste a little gritty? I was wondering what that stuff was in the milk. As for the rest of this sonnet, it really doesn't make much sense to us kitty cats. Our rattled human poet babbles on about irrelevancies like “Klingons”, “parsecs”, “resources” and “governments”, when he could have used his time much more productively by talking to us kitties about such meaty topics as mice, the thrill of the chase and hunt, hoarding skeins of wool to play with and bossing humans around. But, oh no, he would never have thought of writing about the obvious. What else do you expect? He is Canadian, after all, and we call Canucks “beavers”. Leave it to beaver. Still, for a beaver, and a huge one at that, he is kinda cute.
Happily for us Great Cats, the next sonnet was actually a very good poem at the time. Richard Vallance's, “Manx Adoré”, which I understand from his madly gesticulating his arms about his upcoming CD-ROM Book, The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry ISBN 1-878431-52-8 © 2005, to be published later this fall [5] is found in Chapter 9, page 18, under the author's name, actually moved me to tears. It's so very easy to see why too. Here is the ending to this deeply touching sonnet, which left even me in a state of profound mourning, since poor little Adoré has long since died. I am his immediate successor, and I am sure he was as lovable and adorable and as super duper intelligent as am I.
Manx Adoré
And there, now look, I've claimed him, he's a stray!
“You know,” (my voice is cracked) “- he is a manx!”
Stunned, Louis asks, “Ce chat de race, abandonné? *
- such a gentle kitten, so little thanks!”
Held twice, twice freed, he meows a small “hello”
and rubs our door. Will we let him go? No.
© by Richard Vallance 2003
* = “This purebred cat, abandoned so?”
Well, at least those two outstanding and decent humans got THAT right! They saved his darling life. It's just criminal, if you ask me, how many humans either largely ignore their cats, are psychologically cruel to them or worse still, even strike and kick them physically. Why, I wouldn't even do that to a dog, and I hate dogs. Of course, as I am a royal Maine Coon, no angry human would ever be foolish enough to even dream of daring to think for the minutest instance of treating ME like that, or I would be obliged scratch him in an unmentionable place. But my human slave, Richard, hasn't a mean bone in his elephantine body. In fact, he is a first class human to me. He is very affectionate, always accommodating (a necessary human trait) easy to train (even more necessary) and a sucker for cats (a fundamental requirement, if you ask me).
Finally, we have this last little sonnet Richard scrawled off, also in The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry 2005, Chapter 9, page 19, in an entirely justified fit of affection for lil' ole' me, myself and divine moi.
My Silver Maine Coon
Folks come and walk their dogs, one common sight,
though have you ever seen a tabby dash
from her leash released to purring delight,
who flashes meowing up some silver ash?
Say, have you ever seen a cat on leash? Be honest now. Maybe the odd soul has. All I can say is this: seeing dogs on leashes is such a commonplace sight it just bores me to tears, but seeing a cat, especially a forest cat like me, a thoroughly gorgeous Maine Coon, on a leash in the forest, is such a rare sight it makes all the folks my human and I meet go totally ga ga over me, which is only right, don't you think? I'm so divine. They just think I'm so cute and fluffy and adorable. What else? They take scads of photos of me too. The more the merrier, I meow.
MEOW! Sara Russell, our English Kitty-Catter Sonneteer
Now, if you think our Canuck kittie loving sonneteers are such great cat devotees, you should see what English cat-lovers write! Since time immemorial, we keen-sighted cats have always known the English have forever been historically besotted over cats, which is a GOOD thing, because we are much, much more cuddly and adorable than those unmentionable, loudly barking, smelly creatures, dogs. Ugh. On the other hand, I must admit that Sara Russell, like most English cat lovers, is a real sucker for us cats, but, hey, can she help it? She's English, after all, and she's a sweetheart. Besides, loving cats goes with our territory there, i.e. the whole of the United Kingdom. Anyway, enough about her. Let's have a silvery clear-sighted feline look at a couple of her sonnets, on the understanding that we cats do SEE a lot better than humans, especially in the dark. So if she's got anything to hide, we'll surely ferret it out of the shadows of the night.
In Chapter 16 of The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry 2005, Ms. Russell tops off her compassionate sonnet with this strange conclusion in her rhyming couplet (and no human jokes about couplets, eh?):
Cats and Rain [5, to be published this fall: see note ]
My darling cat, although I feel your pain,
Humans are not responsible for rain.
© by Sara Russell 2002
Now, Sara Russell has informed me that no sonnet worth its salt is really any good unless the final rhyming couplet packs a real wallop. Apparently all humans believe this about sonnets, which is also a GOOD thing, though, again, I ask you, what could be more caterwaulingly obvious? After all, without our feline rhyming couplets, which do pack a real wallop, there'd be no cats in the world at all. Rhyming couplets are all about procreation, at least for us smart cats. While human rhyming couplets unfortunately don't usually result in procreation, unless they're under cover, they are the climax to any sonnet, and as such, rhyming couplets can make or break the sonnet's punch, as it were. So Sara's got a sharp point here I purr to claw to your attention.
Suffice it to say, though, Sara has got it all wrong with the conclusion of her rhyming couplet. You humans ARE responsible for rain! Who the heck else would be? Allow me to explain logically. It's really very simple, dearest Sara, if only you would apply your feline wit to the task. You are the one who lets my brother, Harley, out. Right? Right. If it's sunny, it's sunny. Right? If it's cloudy, it's cloudy. If it's raining, it's raining? Go figure. So, no matter when you let us out, you let us out. It does what it does, and since we can't let ourselves out, we can't blame ourselves - especially for something as humdrum as the weather, eh? I mean, really, dear! Anyway, Harley understands. I am sure he forgives you, so long as you don't let him out in the rain too often, mind you. Every time Richard takes me to the door on my leash, and it's raining outside, I just emit a little “brrrt”, swish my tail but vigorously and hightail it right back up the stairs. Rain. Ugh! Who needs it?
Cautiously crawling on all fours to Sara's next sonnet on page 5, Chapter 16, wherein, to wit, the rhyming couplet is once again the most truly memorable part, we find our human lamenting:
Dear Cat (Sonnet for Harley) [5]
You wander off for miles so aimlessly,
Till love and hunger call you back to me.
Now now, dear, dear Sara, are you sure it's love for you alone that drives Harley back to you? He just recently sent me an e-mail letting me know he visits several households in the neighbourhood where folks find him so endearing they just have to feed the poor little tyke. I have a female feline friend, Tuffy, who wanders free and does the very same thing. They both know exactly what they're doing, dearest Sara. Still, Harley DID say he does love you more than any other human who loves him, because you are the kindest soul he knows, apart from your hubby. And he also said he will always be loyal to you. Ain't he so lovable and cute? Count yourself lucky, girl.
By now it should be glaringly obvious that the most vital part of a human sonnet is the rhyming couplet. That really makes sense, when you come to think of it, since coupling is so much fun, as we kitties know only too well. Caterwaul! I would like to illustrate my clawing point as sharply as I can by referring to the rhyming couplet of one more kitty sonnet by Sara Russell (NPA, Chapter 16, page 7), where she comes to the belated realization that we kitties hugely value our independence and freedom, as I was intimating in her previous sonnet's couplet. Here, says she (no doubt tongue-in-cheek), as if it isn't the most obvious truism in the world:
Let Me Out [Click on the title to read the whole sonnet]
"O let me out, to rule at Garden's End,
Be not my jailer; I will be your friend."
Well, Sara, you human genius, bravo! You have stumbled upon one of the IMMUTABLE LAWS OF THE UNIVERSE. Cats rule! If you are our friends, we’ll love you for sure. Otherwise, forget it, you're history. Take Richard too. He simply adores me as if I were the Queen of Canada, and I am, just as you, Harley, are the undisputed King of England. Why, I could be your Queen Consort!
Grrr! Mitchell Geller's Evil, Evil Scheme
In Chapter 22 of The New Pleiades Anthology, Mitchell Geller, who hails from “cultivated” Boston, Mass., and who should ergo know better, composes a weird villanelle in which he boasts about poisoning the local yappy yappy, insanely irritating Scottie. Ouch, my poor delicate feline ears! He is bang on when he reminds us all that Scotties and all wee doggies who yelp like they're in excruciating pain drive at least a few sensitive humans and all us cats nuts with their constant yapping. But do we kill dogs? Nah. We just scratch their fat schnozzes. After that, you won't see any wee waggers yelping around us. Problem fixed. Why, once a huge German Shepherd came thumping up to me, growling like a great big frigging tongue lolling wolf, and tried to attack me, thinking he could render me to bits. WRONG. I merely puffed myself up like a huge fluffy hot air balloon, made my tail as fat as a broom, hissed like a viper, screeched like a banshee, and gave him such a nasty whelp across his miserable snout he just hightailed it off, yelping like a little puppy with its tail between its legs. Heh, heh, heh. Never saw him again at close range. I've seen him ramble on by on his leash, sulking like the Green Hulk, but he's way way too scared to come within a 100 metres of me. Rightly so. Grrrr. Pfffst. Moral of the story? Hey, humans, you should never kill a dog or, worse yet, a cat. If a dog bugs me, I just have to scratch him once where it smarts, and he's history to me.
Anyway, here is Mitchell Geller's oddball, if permanently effective, solution to the problem of hysterically barking dogs.
Puppy Love (villanelle)
First Stanza
The scotty's barking drove me nearly mad,
and so I had to feed her anti-freeze.
I don't regret it, nor do I feel bad.
Last Stanza
My neighbor bought a cat!
Scheherezade is white and fluffy, quiet as a breeze.
The scotty's barking drove me nearly mad.
I don't regret it, nor do I feel bad.
Well, at least his neighbour got it right. He acquired a cat, or more to the point, his cat, Scheherezade (appropriate name for a cat) acquired him.
MEOW! Passionate Spanish? Methinks not!
Creeping ever so stealthily in on another sonneteer, this one an Argentinean, which is supposed to translate as passionate Spanish, we have this condescending but theologically incorrect observation by Carmen Ruggero in the fall 2004 issue of SONNETTO POESIA:
Feline Love [Click on the title to read the whole sonnet]
Wake up darling it’s time for your dinner.
Stretchy, stretchy, lover wants a pillow?
Sleep by day, carouse all night. You sinner,
sunrise finds you weary as the willow.
First off, the sinner, let's face it, is nary the cat, but the human, for daring to imagine her cat has sinned! After all, we cats are naturally entitled to sleep on something soft anywhere we like, whether it be on our dear human's bed, no matter how uncomfortable it leaves him or her, or on any cushion in the house (but bigger cushions are better) or in the middle of the bear rug. Surely you know, dearest Carmen, kindly as you are, we cats sleep a long time because we need our beauty sleep. This is the main reason why we are so exceedingly lovely. If you humans slept as long as we do you would probably be as beautiful as we are. We sleep just the right amount of time. Go figure. Last, but far from least, as I already hissed, cats never sin. We're far far too perfect for that. For instance, do we need to go to church? Naah. Does God forgive us? I should think so! As Richard Vallance himself humbly admits, “To round out our commentary on the Introit, we note that Smart almost immediately refers to his beloved cat as none other than "the servant of the Living God", high praise indeed, usually reserved for human prophets and saints.” [6]. For all his insight, our human critic has got it backwards. God reserves His praise for us cats first, and only then for human prophets and saints. Besides, the fact that humans needs saints proves they sin, doesn't it? Told you so. Meow.
Purr, purr! She Worships Me, She Worships Me, Yeah!
To round out our feline review on kitties, we are proud (as in cat pride!) to bring to your edifying attention these two charming little kitty ditties by none other than our dear, dear friend, Helga Ross of Canada, "His Lopsided Grin” and “Scaredy-Cat Sonnet”, in which Ms. Ross has the presence of mind, delectable in a human, to pour her effusive loving devotion all over her cats, a very smart maneuver on her part, I dare say. Permit me to quote these utterly charming lines from “His Lopsided Grin” [6].
His Lop-Sided Grin [7]
A godlike glint of topaz eyes meets mine,
a hint of lion lineage, a king,
my feline lolls, his finest form's recline,
stares, slivered almond pupils narrowing.
To blush! (but only once) “A godlike glint of topaz eyes" and "... his finest form’s recline...” So lovely! That's what it's all about, girl: divine form. And do we cats not have it in droves? Yessiree, we kitties know how to put on the Ritz. Meow to that. Now, if you poor, dear humans (sweet as you are) would only learn to worship us cats as Helga Ross does and the Egyptians once did, your lives would be much happier, don't you really think so? I do. We cats all know that. We are, after all, the Servants of the Living God. God has sent His Word on High through us to you. Listen and obey.
Pawed, Argentée Vallance 2005
Coming next month, October 2005
Coming Next Month, Part A of “The Introduction” to The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry = Le Florilège de la nouvelle Pléiade. Las Vegas, NV.: Kedco Studios, © 2005. Approximately 700 pp. ISBN 1-878431-52-8 (release date autumn 2005). Vallance Review 50, October 2005, will explore the first “La Pléiade” in Renaissance France, founded by Pierre de Ronsard (1524-1585), Joachim du Bellay (1522-1560) and several other renowned French poets of the age. The review will then focus on the emergence of what is now called, “The New Pleiades” or “La nouvelle Pléiade”, a constellation of 33 poets from 8 nations around the world contributing poems in English, French, German, Japanese-Romanji and Turkish to The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry at the outset of the Third Millennium.
© Richard Vallance (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada) August 27 2005 with the editorial assistance of Jim Dunlap, Des Moines, Iowa, USA
Scratchposted Rufferences & Paw Notes:
[1] To learn more about Maine Coon cats, you may wish to visit:
1.1 Argentée’s page at “Kitties are so Witty” or
1.2 @ Cat Fanciers: The Maine Coon: Cat Breed FAQ. You’ll not fail to notice right away that Argentée, right down to her tail, looks almost exactly like the Maine Coon illustrated on this web site. This is no mere happenstance. Maine Coons very often look almost like this. In fact, if you saw a Maine Coon from Canada, for instance, and one from Germany, you would be hard pressed not to think they were from the same litter!
1.3 Catster: Argentée. Last, but far from least, Argentée has her own home page on the famous Catster.com, where she has been awarded “higher fiver” status, the highest honour any cat can aspire to, and with good reason. She is so beautiful and so clever too!
[3] Moral Incongruity and Humor: the “Good Bad” Poetry of Ogden Nash
[4] Richard’s sonnet, “A Feline’s UFOs” can also be found on our site, Kitties are so Witty on this page My Sonnet: “A Feline’s UFOs”
[5] This sonnet and several others Richard Vallance and Sara Russell have recently composed about her beloved cat, Harley, are to be published this fall in The New Pleiades Anthology of Poetry 2005
[6] Vallance Review 42, “My Cat Jeoffry” by Christopher Smart (1722-1771), Poetry Life & Times, February 2005.
[7] op. cit. [8]. “His Lop-sided Grin” also appears in SONNETTO POESIA ISSN 1705-4524, Vol. 3 no. 4, autumn 2004
Richard Vallance is the author of:
Canadian Federation of Poets: Poetry Lessons: Lesson & Exercise - Week 18 SONNETS
in The Canadian Federation of Poets weekly Poetry Progress Lessons & Exercises series
SONNETTO POESIA is published quarterly in print & is advertised on the front page of the current issue of Poetry Life and Times. To subscribe to SONNETTO POESIA, contact the editor, Richard Vallance. To read the earlier e-zine back issues, visit the sonnet journal's Home Page here:
SONNETTO POESIA ISSN 1705-4524
SONNETTO POESIA ISSN 1705 4524 Vol. 4 no 3, summer 2005 is in print. In this and in every issue thereafter, the first page is dedicated to an historical sonnet, which has been previously been reviewed in The Vallance Review, Poetry Life & Times.
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