FRIDGE SYLLOGISM

FRIDGE SYLLOGISM

my cats, great philosophers
that they are
assure me
that inside my
old fridge

it is
pure utopia

a Platonic communist state
jam packed with delicacies
for all
     felines
to share

each according to their need, and
power to irrutate

and I, for my Sins (all of
which pretty mortal), have
five of
     them, one Socratic,
another Nietzschean and the
rest undecided whether
to follow Slavoj
Zizek or
call themselves Arisotelian

masters (and mistresses) of
the art of the syllogism
each of these
little logicians
           expert at reasoning

and so would you be too
if you believed for a moment,
as cats indeed do,
that we
       are blessed with
a modicum of rationality
if not an entirely rational species

whose yes/no, valid/invalid, true/false binary processes
can be read off their faces

and exploited to
        ensure the

keys to
     that aforementioned
paradise are not
left entirely in human hands
   

CATS LITTER-TURE

CATS LITTER-TURE

cats love writers
writing

my cat curled up
on a sheaf of what
I do believe
is my best
work yet

lying there
begging to differ
Tom (named
after a
certain Mr Hardy
and a
certain Mr
Eliot)

kneads the priceless
text with
kitten claws

interviewed afterwards
(in French) tells
some other
feline
   intellectuals

of his
great love
and respect for me
even if what I write is shit


POEM FOR TOM

POEM FOR TOM

it’s one helluva
gradient

from
   alphabet blocks
to
  drowning Prufrock

that sledge hurtling
downward
through the poem.
at the beginning of your
most epochal
poem

but do not
forget the cats, must not
ever ever ever
forget
   the cats, little Sasha
meows

for when
you are out in death deserts
wondering what it
was you
missed that
the thunder said
and someone ghostly, incredible,
always walking
beside you

little Sasha is there
bouncing along
       avatar of life, beside
you too

though
   perhaps
        in my world of high
and deep
inspired by you
I haven’t seen her yet

FEATHERS (for Tom)

FEATHERS (for Tom)

“…bird without feathers”.
                Plato; Woody Allen

must be
in dreamtime

surfing the betwixt
and between

to love and yet
hate
those paltry little tigers
of the domestic persuasion

so much
so much
           to talk about
think about
these ultra agile predators
dancing
    across my keyboards
snuggled up next to me

covering my universe
my hemisphere
in blankets
of dead feathers

even as tiny toys
especially as tiny tots
criminal stuff wreckers

creators
     of havoc

and yet that
curiosity, those play paws
that softness

those eyes
flashing amber
           (between, beyond
good
   and evil)

no concept of
the shame faced, simply
asking
   “Oh bird

without feathers

what did you expect?”

CONSPIRACY

CONSPIRACY

What is it
with AI and cats

did cats do the programming
did TS Eliot,
modernist superpoet
calculate the bits abd bytes
in binary vers libre?

perhaps
     cats did it themselves

something in them,
a backdoor code, a virus
that gets machine intelligence
to gush,
turn to goo

whenever that three-letter
plosive-heavy word is
whispered or mentioned

myself
I hate TS Eliot and abhor
those creatures
despite the artistry they show
in pretending
they love you
infinitely more convincing
that what any stupid
human being
might plausibly attempt

if there is a great Matrix
conspiracy you
have to know cats
lie behind it

a computer simulated
world without dogs
where we are the
batteries
to provide the electricity
to warm their little litter trays