The Best of Archy and Mehitabel (15 page)

arch your back and caper

and kick at the golden moon

mebby some yeggs

who sell butter and eggs

will fling us a party soon

now then gertie dont get dirty

frankie frankie dont get cranky

and call any lowlife names

remember that you and your sister

were once society dames

and me and nance was debutants

before we was abducted

remember pearl that you was a girl

that a college went and instructed

dont chew the fat with no common cat

for you still got an honored place

oh climb the fence and caper

and kick the moon in the face

oh mebby we all are busted

oh mebby the winters are chill

but all of us girls seen better days

and we are ladies still

remember nell you was once a swell

you was raised a social pet

be careful sweet and act discreet

you may have come down in the world my dear

and you got a cauliflower

onto your ear

but you are a lady yet

meow meow meow

oh wotthell oh wotthell

as i came into the alley

i met a brindle swell

he says to me oh this can be

none but mehitabel

oh willie says i as i passed him by

you know me far too well

then cheerio my deario

prance and pirouette

as long as gents has such intents

theres life in the old world yet

meow meow meow

oh wotthell oh wotthell

i spy you brindle bill

come off the fence you feline gents

theres a dance in the old dame still

meow meow miaow

now then girls no shady jests

here come the gentlemen guests

you try and dance refined

remember you all was ladies born

and still are so inclined

now then sadie dont talk shady

or out you go on your nut

this aint any lousy harlem brawl

this aint any party in webster hall

we gotta recall we are nice girls all

and never was anything but

meow meow meow

archy

mehitabel the cat

tells me the feline

tribe were worshipped

in ancient egypt

and for that reason i

should hold her in more

respect

well says i

minerva burst from

the head of jove

with a heluva yell

but that does not prove

that we should

stand in awe

of every case of

mastoiditis

archy

i was talking

with an insect the

other day about the

hard times that

cockroaches have to

get a living every

mans hand is against them

and occasionally his

foot meals

are few and far between

why in the world

says this

insect do you not

go to the country and become

grasshoppers if

living in town and being

cockroaches is getting

too difficult for you

i was astonished

at the simplicity of the

solution but as i

thought it over it occurred

to me that

perhaps it sounded more

statesmanlike than it

really was

how i asked him are

cockroaches to become

grasshoppers

that is a mere

detail he said which i

leave to you for

solution i have outlined

the general scheme for your

salvation so do not ask

me to settle the mere

details i trust to you for

that you must do

something for yourself

we philosophers cannot do it all

for you unaided you

must learn self help

but alas i fear that

your inherent stupidity will

balk all efforts

to improve your condition

boss i offer you

this little story

for what it is worth

if you are able to

find in it something

analogous to a number

of easy schemes

for the improvement of the

human race you

may do immense good by

printing it

yours for reform

archy

i climbed upon my boss his desk

to type a flaming ballad

and there i found a heap grotesque

of socks and songs and salad

some swedenborgian dope on hell

with modernistic hunches

remnants of plays that would not jell

and old forgotten lunches

a plate once flushed with pride and pie

now chill with pallid verses

a corkless jug of ink hard by

sobbed out its life with curses

six sad bedraggled things lay there

inertly as dead cats

three sexless rhymes that could not pair

and three discouraged spats

the feet of song be tender things

like to the feet of waiters

and need when winter bites and stings

sesquipedalian gaiters

peter the pup sprawled on the heap

disputing all approaches

or growled and grumbled in his sleep

or waked and snapped at roaches

i found a treatise on the soul

which bragged it undefeated

and a bill for thirteen tons of coal

by fate left unreceipted

books on the modern girl s advance

wrapped in a cutey sark

with honi soit qui mal y pense

worked for its laundry mark

mid broken glass the spider slinks

while memories stir and glow

of olden happy far off drinks

and bottles long ago

such is the litter at the root

of song and story rising

or noisome pipe or cast off boot

feeding and fertilizing

as lilies burgeon from the dirt

into the golden day

dud epic and lost undershirt

survive times slow decay

still burrowing far and deep i found

a razor coldly soapy

and at the center of the mound

some most surprising opi

some modest pages chaste and shy

for pocket poke or sporran

written by archy published by

doubleday and doran

archy the cockroach

dear boss i was talking with an ant

the other day

and he handed me a lot of

gossip which ants the world around

are chewing over among themselves

i pass it on to you

in the hope that you may relay it to other

human beings and hurt their feelings with it

no insect likes human beings

and if you think you can see why

the only reason i tolerate you is because

you seem less human to me than most of them

here is what the ants are saying

it wont be long now it wont be long

man is making deserts of the earth

it wont be long now

before man will have used it up

so that nothing but ants

and centipedes and scorpions

can find a living on it

man has oppressed us for a million years

but he goes on steadily

cutting the ground from under

his own feet making deserts deserts deserts

we ants remember

and have it all recorded

in our tribal lore

when gobi was a paradise

swarming with men and rich

in human prosperity

it is a desert now and the home

of scorpions ants and centipedes

what man calls civilization

always results in deserts

man is never on the square

he uses up the fat and greenery of the earth

each generation wastes a little more

of the future with greed and lust for riches

north africa was once a garden spot

and then came carthage and rome

and despoiled the storehouse

and now you have sahara

sahara ants and centipedes

toltecs and aztecs had a mighty

civilization on this continent

but they robbed the soil and wasted nature

and now you have deserts scorpions ants and centipedes

and the deserts of the near east

followed egypt and babylon and assyria

and persia and rome and the turk

the ant is the inheritor of tamerlane

and the scorpion succeeds the caesars

america was once a paradise

of timberland and stream

but it is dying because of the greed

and money lust of a thousand little kings

who slashed the timber all to hell

and would not be controlled

and changed the climate

and stole the rainfall from posterity

and it wont be long now

it wont be long

till everything is desert

from the alleghenies to the rockies

the deserts are coming

the deserts are spreading

the springs and streams are drying up

one day the mississippi itself

will be a bed of sand

ants and scorpions and centipedes

shall inherit the earth

men talk of money and industry

of hard times and recoveries

of finance and economics

but the ants wait and the scorpions wait

for while men talk they are making deserts all the time

getting the world ready for the conquering ant

drought and erosion and desert

because men cannot learn

rainfall passing off in flood and freshet

and carrying good soil with it

because there are no longer forests

to withhold the water in the

billion meticulations of the roots

it wont be long now it won’t be long

till earth is barren as the moon

and sapless as a mumbled bone

dear boss i relay this information

without any fear that humanity

will take warning and reform

archy