The bitter man avoids his dank home,

And his nagging wife,

As more children fall needing feeding, His drunk, miserable life.

Unable to forgive his mother,

Or his bad father, Or his significant, grim other, Or his children’s bad father.

Harder he works, commendable risks, Hardly a life’s care,

He carries on in spite of slipped disks, And drinks until unaware.

Every town has an outcast wench,

The Devil’s woman,

Wicked, this angel to lonely men, Leads him astray; cat-woman.

Sweeping into the bar, lightning in dark,

Sensing his sadness,

Stealing his soul; her mountainous lair, Surreptitiously trapping.

Unwise in his choices, saddened wife.

Talk of the local, Family intervene in his life, Enemies very vocal.

There he returns, an armchair his place,

Watches from the side,

As his own children grow; a new world, Their chances he was denied.

Money rediverted to the home,

Improvements abound, Children’s opportunities to roam, He dreams of a life unbound.

Smoke rises from his chair; smoke and beer,

College, outings, friends, All pass by his weary blur and fear, Of wasting life’s bitter ends.

One sad night the Lord takes his old wife,

With regret he walks,

Follows the coffin, last march of life, Wickedly dreaming of her!

Tries desperately to forget Cat,

Bitterness in soul,

Where evil evolved as he just sat, Hue of smoke, life’s only goal.

Eldest son’s love’s eye’s like cat-woman,

Hauntingly sombre,

Haunting his drunken heart; wed woman, Hauntingly filled, grown fatter.

And when the heart stiffens with such sin,

And when the soul stills,

And when the wrathful anger burns in, The old man dies hauntingly.