She’s common in her diet too— Cheese, liver, milk, or cold beef-stew— And when at last she finds she’s through, She licks her chops as most cats do.
She’s common for the reason that No chipmunk, gopher, mouse or rat Is sure she won’t cave in his slat To decorate our kitchen-mat.
She’s common in the way she’ll toy With life—decoy and then annoy And torture with cool, fiendish joy The thing she would at last destroy.
She’s common in the motherly Devotion with which she can see Her kits lick up the blood—to be Eventually as cruel as she.
She’s common in the attitude Which she’s persistently pursued Toward rearing up a meowing brood— Twice every year the stunt’s renewed.
She’s common in the view she’d share With all those poor folks who declare That the community should care For all the young they choose to bear.
Indeed so common is she here, That should we count each little dear That’s littered every fiscal year, (Her seventh winter’s drawing near),
Allowing six to every score, (At times it’s less but mostly more), The tally would not figure lower Than somewhere say—near eighty-four.
But as four out of every six Are ferried ’cross the River Styx And swiftly rendered good for nix Before they register their kicks,
And whereas those that still remain In order to relieve the strain And thus assuage a mother’s pain Until her grief is on the wane,