Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

My orange cat,
in autumn lanes you come into your own,
chasing curled up rowan leaves like goldfish slithering past you,
a piece of amber, damask wallpaper rolled up
and round the windy avenue
scuttling zigzag fashion.

After cocktails,
freshly laundered and blanket bathed,
on your platformed half-a-tree house,
head turned owl-like in the owl light,
you practise callanetics.
You are old now, but go on,
soon, when they have trained the sea lions,
they will start with you!

A wardrobe cat . . . a spy, a closet walkie talkie
switched on with a twitch of paw in ear,
a rapid whirring of the head,
your flickering aerial up, unravelling a blinkered code.
I call you - you smell a rat,
betray yourself and show your colours?
Do resist!
Soon they'll forge fridge cat-flaps,
and cheese and chicken pocket sandwich makers!

You jumble bag of marbles.
Two, brightened past their bedtimes,
follow my hand around the room.
I am contracted out, a human resource,
a conjurer in the limelights performing tricks.
My wand, well-trained, lays a finger on the spot,
and 'voila!',
a pet performing flea circus especially for you!

You Toby-jug of joy, pouring out your purr
like a ventilating system wheezing to a halt
long after it’s turned off.
White under side all up,
full frontal and no sense of occasion.
Silly sheepskin rug. How you suit yourself,
have you heard of taxidermy?
No? Live on, soon you'll be of age
and they have fished up cats of more than twenty one!