Cat ~ by Charles Baudelaire

I've been re-reading some Charles Baudelaire this year.  I read this one recently and it affected me somehow, so I thought I'd put it out there - on the information highway...

CAT BY CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

As if he owned the place, a cat
    meanders through my mind,
sleek and proud, yet so discreet
    in making known his will

that I hear music when he mews,
    and even when he purrs
a tender timbre in the sound
    compels my consciousness-

a secret rhythm penetrates
    to unsuspected depths,
obsessive as a line of verse
    and potent as a drug:

all woes are spirited away,
    I hear ecstatic news-
it seems a telling language has
     no need of words at all.

My heart, assenting instrument,
     is masterfully played;
no other bow across its strings
     can draw such music out

the way this cat's uncanny voice
     -seraphic, alien-
can reconcile discordant strains
    into close harmony!

One night his brindled fur gave off
     a perfume so intense
I seemed to be embalmed because
     (just once!) I fondled him....

Familiar spirit, genius, judge,
     the cat presides-inspires
events that he appears to spurn,
    half goblin and half god!

and when my spellbound eyes at last
     relinquish worship of
this cat they love to contemplate
     and look inside myself,

I find to my astonishment
     like living opals there
his fiery pupils, embers which
     observe me fixedly.