And The Mouse Police Never Sleeps

Muscled, black with steel — green eye
Swishing through the rye grass
with thoughts of mouse-and-apple pie
Tail balancing at half-mast.
… And The Mouse Police Never Sleeps ***
lying in the cherry tree
Savage bed food-warmer
of priest feline ancestry.
Look out, little furry folk!
Eats but one in every ten ***
leaves the others on the mat.
… And The Mouse Police Never Sleeps ***
waiting by the cellar door.
Window-box town-crier;
birth and death registrar.
With claws that rake a furrow red ***