The Best of Archy and Mehitabel (3 page)

dont you ever eat any sandwiches in your office

i havent had a crumb of bread for i dont know how long

or a piece of ham or anything but apple parings

and paste leave a piece of paper in your machine

every night you can call me archy

boss i am disappointed in

some of your readers they

are always asking how does

archy work the shift so as to get a

new line or how does archy do

this or do that they

are always interested in technical

details when the main question is

whether the stuff is

literature or not

i wish you would leave

that book of george moores on

the floor

mehitabel the cat and i want to

read it i have discovered that

mehitabel s soul formerly inhabited a

human also at least that

is what mehitabel is claiming these

days it may be she got jealous of

my prestige anyhow she and

i have been talking it over in a

friendly way who were you

mehitabel i asked her i was

cleopatra once she said well i said i

suppose you lived in a palace you bet

she said and what lovely fish dinners

we used to have and licked her chops

mehitabel would sell her soul for

a plate of fish any day i told her i thought

you were going to say you were

the favorite wife of the emperor

valerian he was some cat nip eh

mehitabel but she did not get me

archy

this is the song of mehitabel

of mehitabel the alley cat

as i wrote you before boss

mehitabel is a believer

in the pythagorean

theory of the transmigration

of the soul and she claims

that formerly her spirit

was incarnated in the body

of cleopatra

that was a long time ago

and one must not be

surprised if mehitabel

has forgotten some of her

more regal manners

i have had my ups and downs

but wotthehell wotthehell

yesterday sceptres and crowns

fried oysters and velvet gowns

and today i herd with bums

but wotthehell wotthehell

i wake the world from sleep

as i caper and sing and leap

when i sing my wild free tune

wotthehell wotthehell

under the blear eyed moon

i am pelted with cast off shoon

but wotthehell wotthehell

do you think that i would change

my present freedom to range

for a castle or moated grange

wotthehell wotthehell

cage me and i d go frantic

my life is so romantic

capricious and corybantic

and i m toujours gai toujours gai

i know that i am bound

for a journey down the sound

in the midst of a refuse mound

but wotthehell wotthehell

oh i should worry and fret

death and i will coquette

there s a dance in the old dame yet

toujours gai toujours gai

i once was an innocent kit

wotthehell wotthehell

with a ribbon my neck to fit

and bells tied onto it

o wotthehell wotthehell

but a maltese cat came by

with a come hither look in his eye

and a song that soared to the sky

and wotthehell wotthehell

and i followed adown the street

the pad of his rhythmical feet

o permit me again to repeat

wotthehell wotthehell

my youth i shall never forget

but there s nothing i really regret

wotthehell wotthehell

there s a dance in the old dame yet

toujours gai toujours gai

the things that i had not ought to

i do because i ve gotto

wotthehell wotthehell

and i end with my favorite motto

toujours gai toujours gai

boss sometimes i think

that our friend mehitabel

is a trifle too gay

mehitabel the cat claims that

she has a human soul

also and has transmigrated

from body to body and it

may be so boss you

remember i told you she accused

herself of being cleopatra once i

asked her about antony

anthony who she asked me are

you thinking of that

song about rowley and gammon and

spinach heigho for anthony rowley

no i said mark antony the

great roman the friend of

caesar surely cleopatra you

remember j caesar

listen archy she said i

have been so many different

people in my time and met

so many prominent gentlemen i

wont lie to you or stall i

do get my dates mixed sometimes

think of how much i have had a

chance to forget and i have

always made a point of not

carrying grudges over

from one life to the next archy

i have been

used something fierce in my time but

i am no bum sport archy

i am a free spirit archy i

look on myself as being

quite a romantic character oh the

queens i have been and the

swell feeds i have ate

a cockroach which you are

and a poet which you used to be

archy couldn t understand

my feelings at having come

down to this i have

had bids to elegant feeds where poets

and cockroaches would

neither one be mentioned without a

laugh archy i have had

adventures but i

have never been an adventuress

one life up and the next life

down archy but always a lady

through it all and a

good mixer too always the

life of the party archy but never

anything vulgar always free footed

archy never tied down to

a job or housework yes looking

back on it all i can say is

i had some romantic

lives and some elegant times i

have seen better days archy but

whats the use of kicking kid its

all in the game like a gentleman

friend of mine used to say

toujours gai kid toujours gai he

was an elegant cat he used

to be a poet himself and he made up

some elegant poetry about me and him

lets hear it i said and

mehitabel recited

persian pussy from over the sea

demure and lazy and smug and fat

none of your ribbons and bells for me

ours is the zest of the alley cat

over the roofs from flat to flat

we prance with capers corybantic

what though a boot should break a slat

mehitabel us for the life romantic

we would rather be rowdy and gaunt and free

and dine on a diet of roach and rat

roach i said what do you

mean roach interrupting mehitabel

yes roach she said thats the

way my boy friend made it up

i climbed in amongst the typewriter

keys for she had an excited

look in her eyes go on mehitabel i

said feeling safer and she

resumed her elocution

we would rather be rowdy and gaunt and free

and dine on a diet of roach and rat

than slaves to a tame society

ours is the zest of the alley cat

fish heads freedom a frozen sprat

dug from the gutter with digits frantic

is better than bores and a fireside mat

mehitabel us for the life romantic

when the pendant moon in the leafless tree

clings and sways like a golden bat

i sing its light and my love for thee

ours is the zest of the alley cat

missiles around us fall rat a tat tat

but our shadows leap in a ribald antic

as over the fences the world cries scat

mehitabel us for the life romantic

persian princess i dont care that

for your pedigree traced by scribes pedantic

ours is the zest of the alley cat

mehitabel us for the life romantic

aint that high brow stuff

archy i always remembered it

but he was an elegant gent

even if he was a highbrow and a

regular bohemian archy him and

me went aboard a canal boat

one day and he got his head into

a pitcher of cream and couldn t get

it out and fell overboard

he come up once before he

drowned toujours gai kid he

gurgled and then sank for ever that

was always his words archy toujours

gai kid toujours gai i

have known some swell gents

in my time dearie

boss i went

and interviewed the mummy

of the egyptian pharaoh

in the metropolitan museum

as you bade me to do

what ho

my regal leatherface

says i

greetings

little scatter footed

scarab

says he

kingly has been

says i

what was your ambition

when you had any

insignificant

and journalistic insect

says the royal crackling

in my tender prime

i was too dignified

to have anything as vulgar

as ambition

the ra ra boys

in the seti set

were too haughty

to be ambitious

we used to spend our time

feeding the ibises

and ordering

pyramids sent home to try on

but if i had my life

to live over again

i would give dignity

the regal razz

and hire myself out

to work in a brewery