On Poetry

A little bird told me that Miss R.'s students are going to be hosting an International Poetry Potluck on December 15. In preparation, they will be learning to write all sorts of different kinds of poems AND they will memorize a famous poem to recite in front of their parents at their classroom potluck. Talk about your lucky loons (Bob tells me that is an example of alliteration, whatever THAT means.) My neighbor Bob considers himself a jack-of-all-trades.  I don't really know what that means either since his name is Bob, but I do know he is pretty good at poetry.  In fact, at night when our humans are sound asleep in their beds, the cats in our building like to hang out on our decks and converse.  Sometimes, though, we just listen as Bob recites poems.  Some of the poems he recites are from famous writers but others he has written himself.  Last night he taught me this poem.  This one was written by Bob's favorite writer, Anonymous. It's about a cat who owned a human named St. Jerome.  I don't know why the human was called a saint.  Seems to me, we cats are the saints putting up with all their crazy human antics.  Whatever.  Here's the poem. 

St. Jerome's Cat
St. Jerome in his study kept a great big cat,

it's always in his pictures, with its feet upon the mat.

Did he give it milk to drink, in a little dish?

When it came to Friday's, did he give it fish?

If I lost my little cat, I'd be sad without it;

I should ask St. Jerome what to do about it.

I should ask St. Jerome, just because of that,

for he's the only saint I know who kept a kitty cat.

Anonymous

Tell me boys and girls, do you have any favorite poets?  Have you decided which poem you will recite?  Better yet, have you written any poems?  I'd love to read them if you have.