Muscled, black with steel-green eye
Swishing through the rye grass
With thoughts of mouse-and-apple pie.
Tail balancing at half-mast.
And the mouse police never sleeps
Lying in the cherry tree.
Savage bed foot-warmer
Of purest feline ancestry.
Look out, little furry folk!
He's the all-night working cat.
Eats but one in every ten
Leaves the others on the mat.
And the mouse police never sleeps
Waiting by the cellar door.
Window-box town crier;
Birth and death registrar.
With claws that rake a furrow red
Licensed to mutilate.
From warm milk on a lazy day
To dawn patrol on hungry hate.
No, the mouse police never sleeps
Climbing on the ivy.
Windy roof-top weathercock.
Warm-blooded night on a cold tile.