October - A Time for Ghosts

The big white cat

​Meadow Sweet Grove © V. Buchanan, 2016 / edited 2019
This is a poem I wrote as an assignment for a writing class I took a few years back.  It uses a lot of rhyming and is meant to be in "Shel Silverstein" style.  I hope you like it.

​The Right Stuff

The big white cat looked
Up from the fence,
At the old oak tree
Leaving leaves less dense.

The white cat said, to the Oak King,
"Halloween's here, hear me sing.
I can hiss and spit,
And flash my eyes,
Arch my back against a full moon sky.
I be as scary as a black cat be,
Now what do you think,
You old oak tree?"

---

A cat of coal

Not a sound rolled around
From that ancient soul,
But between its leaves,
Stretched a cat of coal.

His eyes they glowed
Like yellow flames and
He bared sharp teeth,
With an aim to maim.

"Best leave to me,"
He said with a boast,
"And wait this out
Behind that post.​
The children are coming up the path
And I've got the stuff to make them dash.
If they see you, "puss, puss" they'll say
And laugh and carry on their way.

---

The trick or treaters

Shamed, the white cat,
Slunk and hid
Behind the post
As he was bid.

But when those posers came quite near,
He thought around the post he'd peer,
Just to see the garb that night,
Of witches, skeletons and the like.

But those kids they screamed!
And fled in fright.
Trick or treat bags
Thrown left and right.

For rounding 'round that post they'd seen
A BIG WHITE GHOST !!
(or so it seemed.)

---

The taunting black cat,
Added a caterwaul,
Laughed to the white cat,
"You're the scariest of us all !!"

So that's the story of the two old cats 
Who learned that night (and it's a fact)
That there's more than one way to skin a cat!

                  (if you'll pardon the expression)

© Vicki Buchanan, 2014, 2016, 2019

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