Read The Lives and Times of Archy and Mehitabel Page 8

  to modjeska s lady macbeth

  but they haven t got it nowadays

  they haven t got it

  here

  mehitabel he says

  both our professions

  are being ruined

  by amateurs

  archy

  archy declares war

  i am going to start

  a revolution

  i saw a kitchen

  worker killing

  water bugs with poison

  hunting pretty

  little roaches

  down to death

  it set my blood to

  boiling

  i thought of all

  the massacres and slaughter

  of persecuted insects

  at the hands of cruel humans

  and i cried

  aloud to heaven

  and i knelt

  on all six legs

  and vowed a vow

  of vengeance

  i shall organize the insects

  i shall drill them

  i shall lead them

  i shall fling a billion

  times a billion billion

  risen insects in an army

  at the throats

  of all you humans

  unless you sign the papers

  for a damn site better treatment

  volunteers volunteers

  hearken to my calling

  fifty million flies

  are wanted may the first

  to die in marmalade

  curses curses curses

  on the cruel human race

  does not the poor mosquito

  love her little offspring

  that you swat against the wall

  out of equatorial

  swamps and fever jungles

  come o mosquitoes

  a billion billion strong

  and sting a billion baldheads

  till they butt against each other

  and break like egg shells

  caterpillars locusts

  grasshoppers gnats

  vampire moths

  black legged spiders

  with red hearts of hell

  centipedes and scorpions

  little gingery ants

  come come come

  come you tarantulas

  with fury in your feet

  bloodsuckers wriggle

  out of the bayous

  ticks cooties hornets

  give up your pleasures

  all your little trivial

  sunday school picnics

  this is war

  in earnest

  and red revolution

  come in a cloud

  with a sun hiding miracle

  of small deadly wings

  swarm stab and bite

  what we want is justice

  curses curses curses

  over land air and water

  whirl in a million

  sweeping and swaying

  cyclonic dances

  whirl high and swoop

  down on the cities

  like a comet bearing death

  in the loop and flick

  of its tail

  little little creatures

  out of all your billions

  make great dragons

  that lie along the sky

  and war with the sunset

  and eat up the moon

  draw all the poison

  from the evil stars

  and spit it on the earth

  remember every planet

  pivots on an atom

  and so you are strong

  i swear by the great

  horned toad of mithridates

  i swear by the vision

  of whiskered old pythagoras

  that i am very angry

  i am mad as hell

  for i have seen a soapy

  kitchen mechanic

  murdering my brothers

  slaying little roaches

  pathetic in their innocence

  damn her red elbows

  damn her spotted apron

  damn her steamy hair

  damn her dull eyes

  that look like a pair

  of little pickled onions

  curses curses curses

  i even heard her praised

  for undertaking murder

  on her own volition

  and called the only perfect

  cook in the city

  come come come

  come in your billions

  tiny small feet

  and humming little wings

  crawlers and creepers

  wigglers and stingers

  scratchers borers slitherers

  little forked tongues

  man is at your mercy

  one sudden gesture

  and all his empires perish

  rise

  strike for freedom

  curses on the species

  that invented roach poison

  curses on the stingy

  beings that evolved

  tight zinc covers

  that you can t crawl under

  for their garbage cans

  come like a sandstorm

  spewed from the mouth

  of a great apocalyptic

  desert making devil

  come like the spray

  sooty and fiery

  snorted from the nostrils

  of a sky eating ogre

  let us have a little

  direct action is the

  sincere wish of

  archy

  the hen and the oriole

  well boss did it

  ever strike you that a

  hen regrets it just as

  much when they wring her

  neck as an oriole but

  nobody has any

  sympathy for a hen because

  she is not beautiful

  while every one gets

  sentimental over the

  oriole and says how

  shocking to kill the

  lovely thing this thought

  comes to my mind

  because of the earnest

  endeavor of a

  gentleman to squash me

  yesterday afternoon when i

  was riding up in the

  elevator if i had been a

  butterfly he would have

  said how did that

  beautiful thing happen to

  find its way into

  these grimy city streets do

  not harm the splendid

  creature but let it

  fly back to its rural

  haunts again beauty always

  gets the best of

  it be beautiful boss

  a thing of beauty is a

  joy forever

  be handsome boss and let

  who will be clever is

  the sad advice

  of your ugly little friend

  archy

  ghosts

  you want to know

  whether i believe in ghosts

  of course i do not believe in them

  if you had known

  as many of them as i have

  you would not

  believe in them either

  perhaps i have been

  unfortunate in my acquaintance

  but the ones i have known

  have been a bad lot

  no one could believe in them

  after being acquainted with them

  a short time

  it is true that i have met

  them under peculiar

  circumstances

  that is while they

  were migrating into the

  bodies of what human beings

  consider a lower order

  of creatures

  before i became a cockroach

  i was a free verse poet

  one of the pioneers of the artless art

  and my punishment for that


  was to have my soul

  enter the body of a cockroach

  the ghosts i have known

  were the ghosts of persons

  who were waiting for a vacant

  body to get into

  they knew they were going

  to transmigrate into the bodies of

  lizards lice bats snakes

  worms beetles mice alley cats

  turtles snails tadpoles

  etcetera

  and while they were waiting

  they were as cross as all get out

  i remember talking to one of them

  who had just worked his way

  upward again he had been in the

  body of a flea and he was going

  into a cat fish

  you would think he might be

  grateful for the promotion

  but not he

  i do not call this much of an advance

  he said why could i not

  be a humming bird or something

  kid i told him it will

  take you a million years to work your

  way up to a humming bird

  when i remember he said

  that i used to be a hat check boy

  in a hotel i could

  spend a million years weeping

  to think that i should come to this

  we have all seen better days i said

  we have all come down in the world

  you have not come down as far

  as some of us

  if i ever get to be a hat check boy

  again he said i will sting

  somebody for what i have had to suffer

  that remark will probably cost you

  another million years among

  the lower creatures i told him

  transmigration is a great thing

  if you do not weaken

  personally my ambition is to get

  my time as a cockroach shortened for

  good behavior and be promoted

  to a revenue officer

  it is not much of a step up but

  i am humble

  i never ran across any of this

  ectoplasm that sir arthur

  conan doyle tells of but it sounds

  as if it might be wonderful

  stuff to mend broken furniture with

  archy

  archy hears from mars

  at eleven o clock

  p m on last saturday evening

  i received the following

  message on my

  own private radio set

  good evening little archibald

  and how are you

  this is mars speaking

  i replied at once

  whom or who

  as the case may be

  do i know on mars

  every one here is familiar

  with your work archy

  was the answer

  and we feel well repaid

  for all the trouble we have had

  in getting in touch

  with your planet

  thank you i replied

  i would rather hear

  mars say that

  than any other planet

  mars has always been

  one of my favorite planets

  it is sweet of you

  to think that way about us

  said mars

  and so we continued to pay

  each other interstellar

  compliments

  what is or are

  thirty five million miles

  between kindred souls

  tell us all about

  your planet said mars

  well i said it is

  round like an orange

  or a ball

  and it is all cluttered

  up with automobiles

  and politicians

  it doesn t know where it is

  going nor why

  but it is in a hurry

  it is in charge of a

  two legged animal called

  man who is genuinely

  puzzled as to whether

  his grandfather was a god

  or a monkey

  i should think said mars

  that what he is himself

  would make more difference

  than what his grandfather was

  not to this animal i replied

  he is the great alibi ike of

  the cosmos when he raises hell

  just because he feels like

  raising hell

  he wants somebody to blame it on

  can t anything be done about him

  said mars

  i am doing the best i can

  i answered

  but after all i am only one

  and my influence is limited

  you are too modest archy

  said mars

  we all but worship you

  here on this planet

  a prophet said i is not

  without honor save on his own

  planet wait a minute

  said mars

  i want to write that down

  that is one of your best things

  archy is it original

  it was once i answered truthfully

  and may be again

  won t you tell us a little

  something said mars

  about yourself what you look like

  and what you think

  is the best thing you have written

  and your favorite games

  and that sort of thing

  well i said i am brunette

  and stand over six feet

  without any shoes on

  the best skits i have done

  were some little plays

  i dashed off

  under the general title

  of shakespeare s plays

  and my favorite sport is theology

  you must meet

  a great many interesting people

  said mars

  oh yes i said one becomes

  accustomed to that after a while

  what is your favorite dish

  said mars and do you believe

  in the immortality of the soul

  stew i said and yes

  at least mine is immortal

  but i could name several others

  that i have my doubts about

  is there anything else

  of interest about your planet

  which you wish to tell your

  many admirers on mars

  asked mars

  there is very little else

  of any real interest i said

  and now will you tune out

  and let me do some work

  you people who say you admire

  my work are always butting in

  and taking up my time

  how the hell can i get any

  serious literary work done

  if you keep bothering me

  all the time now you get off

  the ether and let me do some

  deep thinking

  you might add that i am shy

  and loathe publicity

  archy

  —you gotta dance till the sun comes up …

  mehitabel dances with boreas

  well boss i saw mehitabel

  last evening

  she was out in the alley

  dancing on the cold cobbles

  while the wild december wind

  blew through her frozen whiskers

  and as she danced

  she wailed and sang to herself

  uttering the fragments

  that rattled in her cold brain

  in part as follows

  whirl mehitabel whirl

  spin mehitabel spin

  thank god you re a lady still

  if you have got a frozen skin

  blow wind out of the north

  to hell with being a pet

  my left front foot i
s brittle

  but there s life in the old dame yet

  dance mehitabel dance

  caper and shake a leg

  what little blood is left

  will fizz like wine in a keg

  wind come out of the north

  and pierce to the guts within

  but some day mehitabel s guts

  will string a violin

  moon you re as cold as a frozen

  skin of yellow banan

  that sticks in the frost and ice

  on top of a garbage can

  and you throw a shadow so chilly

  that it can scarcely leap

  dance shadow dance

  you ve got no place to sleep

  whistle a tune north wind

  on my hollow marrow bones

  i ll dance the time with three good feet

  here on the alley stones

  freeze you bloody december

  i never could stay a pet

  but i am a lady in spite of hell

  and there s life in the old dame yet

  whirl mehitabel whirl

  flirt your tail and spin

  dance to the tune your guts will cry

  when they string a violin

  eight of my lives are gone

  it s years since my fur was slicked

  but blow north wind blow

  i m damned if i am licked

  girls we was all of us ladies

  we was o what the hell

  and once a lady always game

  by crikey blood will tell

  i might be somebody s pet

  asleep by the fire on a rug

  but me i was always romantic

  i had the adventurous bug

  caper mehitabel caper

  leap shadow leap

  you gotta dance till the sun comes up

  for you got no place to sleep

  i might have been many a tom cat s wife

  but i got no regret

  i lived my life as i liked my life

  and there s pep in the old dame yet

  blow wind out of the north

  you cut like a piece of tin

  slice my guts into fiddle strings

  and we ll have a violin

  spin mehitabel spin

  you had a romantic past

  and you re gonna cash in dancing

  when you are croaked at last

  i will not eat tomorrow

  and i did not eat today

  but wotthehell i ask you

  the word is toujours gai

  whirl mehitabel whirl

  i once was a maltese pet

  till i went and got abducted

  and cripes i m a lady yet

  whirl mehitabel whirl

  and show your shadow how

  tonight its dance with the bloody moon

  tomorrow the garbage scow

  whirl mehitabel whirl

  spin shadow spin

  the wind will pipe on your marrow bones

  your slats are a mandolin