Hear and attend and listen; for this is what befell and be-happened and became and was, O my Best Beloved, when the Tame animals were wild. The dog was wild, and the Horse was wild, and the Cow was wild, and the Sheep was wild, and the Pig was wild -as wild as wild could be - and they walked in the Wet Wild Woods by their wild lones. But the wildest of all the wild animals was the Cat. He walked by himself and all places were alike to him

Follow the dream, and always the dream, and only the dream.

Till the master of all good workmen shall set us to work anew.

Cat said, 'I am not a friend, and I am not a Servant. I am the Cat who walks by himself, and I wish to come into your Cave.'

And that is called paying the Dane-geld; but we've proved it again and again, that if once you have paid him the Dane-geld you never get rid of the Dane.

I will remember what I was, I am sick of rope and chains - I will remember my old strength and all my forest affairs. I will not sell my back to man for a bundle of sugar cane; I will go out to my own kind, and the wood-folk in their lairs. I will go out until the day, until the morning break - Out to the wind's untainted kiss, the water's clean caress; I will forget my ankle-ring and snap my picket stake. I will revisit my lost love and playmates masterless!

One half of my head, from the top of my skull to the cleft of my jaw, hammers, bangs, sizzles while the other half, serene and content, looks on at the agony next door.