A Ravin’ / The Tom-Cat
1873
Published as “A Ravin’” in Figaro, 27 August 1873; this version from The Leigh Chronicle and Weekly District Advertiser, 30 August 1873, p. 3; later published as “The Tom-Cat” in The Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners Advocate (New South Wales, Australia), 23 February 1889, p. 9
Once upon a midnight dreary, as I slumbered, cross and weary,
Cross, from several horrid boring books of theologic lore,
While they haunted me in napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some confounded rapping, rapping at my bedroom door.
“’Tis some rascal,” low I muttered, “who’s too screwed to find his door,—
Only this and nothing more!”
Ah! I vividly remember, it was in a cold December,
And of fire I had no ember till the price of coals should low’r;
Eagerly I wished the morrow; being broke, again I’ll borrow,
Even although it end in sorrow, from an Uncle, loved of yore—
From a useful, prosp’rous Uncle, who to me is worth a score.
Surely this, if nothing more!
And the creaking, low, uncertain rustling of the muslin curtain
Made me shiver in such style as I had never done before,
So that now to still the beating of my pulse, I lay repeating
“Who the mischief’s still entreating entrance at a fellow’s door?
’Tis some staggering Bacchanalian hammering coolly at my door,—
That’s what ’tis, and nothing more!”
Up I got, and ope’d the shutter, when, without the slightest flutter,
Sat a dissipated Tom-cat coolly down upon the floor;
Though he looked exceeding shady, not a moment stopped or stayed he,
But with impudence unheard of walked right to the bedroom door,
Perched upon a corner cupboard just beside my bedroom door,
Whisked his tail, and nothing more!
Then, this scraggy “Tom” beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the gay and rakish contour of his countenance it wore,
“May my head be closely shaven, if I don’t believe I’m ravin’;
Ghastly, battered, graceless Tom-cat, wandering from the nightly-shore,
What’s your name, you gay Lothario, tell me ere you leave my door?”
Quoth the Thomas, “Never more.”
Much I marvelled this ungainly beast to hear discourse so plainly,
Tho’ its answer little meaning, little relevancy bore;
For I hope we’re all agreeing that no living human being
Ever had the chance of seeing Tom-cat near his bedroom door,
Moody Tom-cat on a cupboard, just beside his chamber door,
With such a name as “Never more!”
But as yet, instead of “riling,” since the cat provoked my guiling,
Straight I dragged a damaged easy-chair athwart the cupboard-door,
Carefully upon it sinking (for ’twas giving way like winking),
I betook myself to thinking what this vagrant beast of yore,
What this horrid, low, immoral, gaunt, and vagrant beast of yore,
Meant by squalling “Never more!”
“Prophet,” said I, “Thing of evil! prophet still, if cat or devil?
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest toss’d thee here ashore;
Battered thou, and all undaunted, in this room they say is haunted,
If you are at all enchanted, tell me truly, I implore,
Will the coals be ever cheaper? Tell me, tell me, I implore!”
Quoth the Tom-cat, “Never more!”
Return to the Quaint and Curious index for more pastiches and parodies of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”.
