Beverly Patterson
The Cat Killed Curiosity
To make a short story
long, invention is
the mother of necessity
and too many
broths can spoil
the cook—want not
waste not.
Manner your minds.
Contempt breeds
familiarity.
Birds of a flock feather
together and if you lie
down with fleas
you’ll wake up
with dogs. Let lying
cats sleep.
There’s a madness
to the method. Every
silver lining
has a cloud
and sometimes words
speak louder
than actions.
Now look
what dragged in
the cat.
Curiosity Killed the Cat
To make a long story
short, necessity is
the mother of invention
and too many
cooks can spoil
the broth–waste not
want not.
Mind your manners.
Familiarity breeds
contempt.
Birds of a feather flock
together and if you lie
down with dogs
you'll wake up
with fleas. Let sleeping
cats lie.
There's a method
to the madness. Every
cloud has a
silver lining
and sometimes actions
speak louder
than words.
Now look
what the cat
dragged in.
ABOUT THIS POEM
“A word after a word after a word is power” and Georgia O’Keeffe said, “I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way – things I had no words for.”
This artwork combines these ideas. Head on, letters float peacefully among a flock of birds as the sun sets. Viewed from the left, a poem is discoverable, “Curiosity Killed the Cat” and it is comprised entirely of common idioms. Viewed from the right, another poem emerges, “The Cat Killed Curiosity.” In this poem, the idioms are all reversed. The effect is to turn everything on its head and into question, “there’s a madness to the method.” The poem’s last sentence, “Now look what dragged in the cat” serves as an instruction for the viewers to consider the weight of each rephrasing that precedes it.