This is the story of Boris the cat,
A cat who was wide and strong (not fat),
Who had used only four of the full set of lives,
And had both bloody ears and both bloody eyes.

Boris would sit on the sofa all day,
And people would look down and smile, and say, 
‘What a great life, the life of a cat,
How I would love to live life like that!’

‘To eat all you want and drink saucers of cream,
To sleep all the day and contentedly dream,
Of rubs on the belly and comfortable beds,
And soft catnip mice with chewable heads.’

An Boris would listen with eyes halfway closed,
And think of the things that nobody knows.
Think of the things that you’d meet in the night,
The spine chilling, blood freezing, dealers of fright,

The monsters with claws that could cut to the bone,
The scuttling hordes that would trap you alone,
The bright eyed and grinning suckers of blood,
The things that would hold you face-down in the mud. 

But Boris gave less than two figs for that stuff,
Because Boris was hard and incredibly tough. 
Boris could leap up six feet in the air,
From a standing jump (and with power to spare).

And Boris could pounce with professional skill,
Or stroll down a narrow and wet windowsill.
And could fix any foe with an unblinking eye,
And curdle their blood with a yodelling cry. 

Boris was ruthless, cunning and brave,
And stalked through the night and slept through the days,
And laughed at his humans, who really were dim,
And hadn’t yet twigged that she wasn’t a him.