To Be As We Are To Be

Oh to be a cat in the sun on a summer day.
To drift through the days and scamper through nights,
from the bake of the rays and the squeal of the mice.
To chatter so loudly,
to play as we like.
What a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful life.

Yet the sun also sets,
the coldest of regrets.
Our paws once will shrivel,
our skin will abscess.
The lightest of touches,
the softest caress,
the heaviest hand,
and the roughest of pets,
certain to bring only pain in the light of the rest.

To sneak and to sly,
to live and to die.
To slurp and devour,
to dream as we lie.
The sun in a shower,
the beast of the eye.
What lasts is no longer for you and for I.

Oh to be a cat in the sun on a winter day.
To drift through the days and to linger through nights,
from the shock of the wind and the frost of the bite.
In a hand, as a claw, there is nothing so right,
As to chatter so loudly,
to freeze in the light.
To abandon companions and dream of the mice.
To remember the living and live as we like.
Oh, to be loved, as a cat and its fight.
What a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful life.