For all of us with older or poorly cats - one of my favourite poems

[fjm]

I am sure this will have been posted here before, but it is so very much how I feel about Pip, and I am sure will speak to others too. Just one more summer... and then another... and another.

A 14-year old convalescent cat

I want him to have another living summer
to lie in the sun and enjoy the douceur de vivre -
because the sun, like golden rum in a rummer,
is what makes an idle cat un tout petit peu ivre -

I want him to lie stretched out, contented,
revelling in the heat, his fur all dry and warm,
an Old Age Pensioner, retired, resented
by no one, and happinesses in a beelike swarm

to settle on him, postponed for another season
that last fated hateful journey to the vet
from which there is no return (and age the reason),
which must soon come - as I cannot forget.

Gavin Ewart (b: 1916)

[Lilith]

Awww!

[alanc]

I love that poem and have recited it to all my cats when they reach 14.

[Lilith]

I think cats are living longer these days. For some reason I always knew my first Siamese, Jacinth, a blue-point, would die at 14, and she did. Then Emily came along and she shares so many mannerisms with Jacinth that I often call her Jacinth or Jassy. She's my avatar cat ... apparently jacinths can be orange too. I don't care for the idea of reincarnation but in this case ...

Emily/Jassy has made it till almost 17 but now has ckd; I do like the idea of her lying in the sun, intoxicated ... hope to be doing the same thing this summer myself ...

Mousey is only six months younger but has been given a whole new lease of life with the hyperthyroid treatment, great hefty lump she is.

Molly will only be 7 this summer, in her prime, that perfection when every single hair on her coat gleams right down to her skin, not so long since Emily was the same despite a poor start in life.

If only we could keep them for ever like that!