Are you blind when you're born?
Can you see in the dark?
Dare you look at a king?
Would you sit on his throne?
Can you say of your bite that it's worse than your bark?
Are you cock of the walk when you're walking alone?

Because Jellicles are and Jellicles do
Jellicles do and Jellicles would
Jellicles would and Jellicles can
Jellicles can and Jellicles do

When you fall on your head,
Do you land on your feet?
Are you tense when you sense
There's a storm in the air?
Can you find your way blind
When you're lost in the street?
Do you know how to go to the Heaviside Layer?

Because Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicles do and Jellicles can
Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicles do and Jellicles can
Jellicles can and Jellicles do

Can you ride on a broomstick to places far distant?
Familiar with candle, with book, and with bell?
Were you Whittington's friend?
The Pied Piper's assistant?
Have you been an alumnus of heaven and hell?

Are you mean like a minx?
Are you lean like a lynx?
Are you keen to be seen when you're smelling a rat?
Were you there when the pharaohs commissioned the Sphinx?
If you were and you are, you're a Jellicle Cat!

Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats

We can dive through the air like a flying trapeze
We can turn double somersaults, bounce on a tire
We can run up a wall, we can swing through the trees
We can balance on bars, we can walk on a wire

Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats

Can you sing at the same time in more than one key?
Duets by Rossini and waltzes by Strauss?
And can you (as cats do) begin with a 'C'?
That always triumphantly brings down the house?

Jellicle Cats are queen of the nights
Singing at astronomical heights
Handling pieces from 'The Messiah'
Hallelujah, angelical choir

The mystical divinity of unashamed felinity
'Round the cathedral rang 'Vivat'
Life to the everlasting cat!
Feline, fearless, faithful and true
To others who do
What

Jellicles do and Jellicles can
Jellicles can and Jellicles do
Jellicle Cats sing Jellicle Chants
Jellicles old and Jellicles new
Jellicle song and Jellicle dance
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats

Practical cats, dramatical cats, pragmatical cats, fanatical cats
Oratorical cats, delphicoracle cats, skeptical cats, dispeptical cats
Romantical cats, pedantical cats, critical parasitical cats, allegorical cats
Metaphorical cats, statistical cats, and mystical cats
Political cats, hypocritical cats, clerical cats, hysterical cats
Cynical cats, rabbinical cats

Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats
Jellicle songs for Jellicle Cats

There's a man over there with a look of surprise
As much as to say as to say, well now how about that?
Do I actually see with my own very eyes
A man who's not heard of a Jellicle Cat?
What's a Jellicle Cat?
What's a Jellicle Cat?

The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter
It isn't just one of your holiday games
You may think at first I'm mad as a hatter
When I tell you a cat must have three different names

First of all, there's the name that the family use daily
Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James
Such as Victor or Jonathan, George or Bill Bailey
All of them are sensible, everyday names

There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter
Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames
Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter,
But all of them sensible, everyday names

But I tell you, a cat needs a name that's particular
A name that's peculiar and more dignified
Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular?
Or spread out his whiskers or cherish his pride?

Of names of this kind, I can give you a quorum
Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat
Such as Bombalurina or else Jellylorum
Names that never belong to more than one cat

But above and beyond, there's still one name left over
And that is the name that you will never guess
The name that no human research can discover
But the cat himself knows and will never confess

When you notice a cat in profound meditation,
The reason, I tell you, is always the same
His mind is engaged in rapt contemplation
Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name
His ineffable, effable, effanineffable
Deep and inscrutable singular name
Name, name, name, name, name, name

Jellicle Cats come out tonight
Jellicle cats come one, come all
The Jellicle Moon is shining bright
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball

Jellicle Cats come out tonight
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball

Jellicle cats come out tonight
Jellicle cats come one, come all
The Jellicle Moon is shining bright
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball

Jellicle Cats come out tonight
Jellicle cats come one, come all
The Jellicle Moon is shining bright
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball

Jellicle Cats meet once a year
At the Jellicle Ball
Where we all rejoice!
And the Jellicle leader will soon appear
And make what is known as the Jellcle Choice

When Old Deuteronomy, just before dawn
Through a silence you feel you could cut with a knife
Announces the cat who can now be reborn
And come back to a different Jellicle life

For waiting up there is the Heaviside Layer
With wonders one Jellicle only will see
And Jellicles ask, Because Jellicles dare:

"Who will it be?"
"Who will it be?"

I have a Gumbie Cat in mind
Her name is Jennyanydots
Her coat is of the tabby kind with tiger stripes and leopard spots
All day she sits beneath the stairs or on the steps or on the mat
She sits and sits and sits and that's what makes a Gumbie cat
That's what makes a Gumbie Cat

But
When the day's hustle and bustle is done
Then the Gumbie Cat's work is but hardly begun.
And when all the family's in bed and asleep,
She tucks up her skirts to the basement to creep
She is deeply concerned with the ways of the mice:
"Their behavior's not good and their manners not nice."
So when she has got them lined up on the matting
She teaches them music, crocheting and tatting

I have a Gumbie Cat in mind.
Her name is Jennyanydots.
The curtain cord she likes to wind and tie it into sailor knots
She sits upon the windowsill or anything that's smooth and flat.
She sits and sits and sits and that's what makes a Gumbie Cat
That's what makes a Gumbie Cat

But
When the day's hustle and bustle is done
Then the Gumbie Cat's work is but hardly begun
She thinks that the cockroaches "need employment
To prevent them from idle and wanton destroyment "

So she's formed from that lot of disorderly louts
A troop of well-disciplined helpful boy scouts
With a purpose in life and a good deed to do
And she's even created a Beetles Tattoo!

For she's a Jolly Good Fellow…
"Thank you, my dears!"

The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious cat!

"If you offer me pheasant, I'd rather have grouse.
If you put me in a house, I would much prefer a flat.
If you put me in a flat, then I'd rather have a house.
If you set me on a mouse, then I only want a rat.
If you set me on a rat, then I'd rather chase a mouse."

The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious cat
"And there isn't any need for me to shout it!"
For he will do as he do do
"And there's no doing anything about it!"

The Rum Tum Tigger is a terrible bore!

"When you let me in, then I want to go out!
I'm always on the wrong side of every door.
And as soon as I'm at home, then I'd like to get about!
I like to lie in the bureau drawer,
But I make such a fuss if I can't get out."

The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious cat
"And there isn't any need for you to doubt it"
For he will do as he do do
"And there's no doing anything about it"!

The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious beast!

"My disobliging ways are a matter of habit.
If you offer me fish, then I always want a feast.
When there isn't any fish, then I won't eat rabbit.
If you offer me cream, then I sniff and sneer;
For I only like what I find for myself.
So you'll catch me in it right up to my ears
If you put it away on the larder shelf!"

The Rum Tum Tugger is artful and knowing
The Rum Tum Tugger oesn't care for a cuddle

"But I'll leap upon your lap in the middle of your sewing
For there's nothing I enjoy like a horrible muddle!"

The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious cat
The Rum Tum Tugger doesn't care for a cuddle
The Rum Tum Tugger is a curious cat

"And there isn't any need for me to spout it"
For he will do as he do do
"And there's no doing anything about it!"

Remark! The cat who hesitates toward you;
In the light of the door which opens on her like a grin.
You see the border of her coat is torn and stained with sand.
And you see the corner of her eye twist like a crooked pin.

She haunted many a low resort
Near the grimy road of Tottenham Court.
She flitted about the No Man's Land
From "The Rising Sun" to "The Friend at Hand"
And the postman sighed as he scratched his head,
"You'd really had thought she ought to be dead."
And who would ever suppose that that
Was Grizabella, the Glamour Cat?

Grizabella, the glamour cat
Grizabella, the glamour cat
Who would ever suppose that that
Was Grizabella, the glamour cat?

Bustopher Jones is not skin and bones.
In fact, he's remarkably fat.
He doesn't haunt pubs.
He has eight or nine clubs
For he's the St. James Street cat!

He's the cat we all greet as we walk down the street.
In his coat of fastidious black.
No common-place mousers have such well-cut trousers
Or such an impeccable back.
In the whole of St. James's the smartest of names
Is the name of this Brummell of cats.
And we're all of us proud to be nodded or bowed to
By Bustopher Jones in white spats.

"My visits are occasional to the Senior Educational.
And it is against the rules
For any one cat to belong both to that,
And the Joint Superior Schools.

"When I'm seen in a hurry there's probably curry
At the Siamese or at the Glutton.
When I look full of gloom then I've lunched at the Tomb
On cabbage, rice pudding and mutton."

In the whole of St. James's the smartest of names is
The name of this Brummell of cats.
And we're all of us proud to be nodded or bowed to
By Bustopher Jones in white -
Bustopher Jones in white -
Bustopher Jones in white spats!

So much in this way passes Bustopher's day
At one club or another he's found.
It can be no surprise that under our eyes.
He has grown unmistakably round.

He's a twenty-five pounder "or I am a bounder".
And he's putting on weight every day.
"But I'm so well preserved because I've observed
All my life a routine and I'd say –
"I am still in my prime.
I shall last out my time."
That's the word from this stoutest of cats.

It must and it shall be spring in Pall Mall.
While Bustopher Jones wears white -
Bustopher Jones wears white -
Bustopher Jones wears white spats!

Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer were a notorious couple of cats
As knockabout clowns, quick-change comedians,
Tight-rope walkers and acrobats.
They had an extensive reputation.
They made their home in Victoria Grove.
That was merely their center of operation
For they were incurably given to rove.

If the area window was found ajar
And the basement looked like a field of war.
If a tile or two came loose on the roof
Which presently ceased to be waterproof.
If the drawers were pulled out from bedroom chests
And you couldn't find one of your winter vests.
Or after supper one of the girls
Suddenly missed her Woolworth pearls . . .

Then the family would say,
"It's that horrible cat!
It was Mungojerrie or Rumpleteazer!"
And most of the time,
They left it at that.

Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer had an unusual gift of the gab.
They were highly efficient cat burglars as well
And remarkably smart at a smash and grab.
They made their home in Victoria Grove.
They had no regular occupation.
They were plausible fellows who liked to engage
A friendly policeman in conversation.

When the family assembled for Sunday dinner,
Their minds made up that they wouldn't get thinner on
Argentine joint, potatoes and greens
Then the cook would appear from behind the scenes.
And say in a voice that was broken with sorrow,
"I'm afraid you must wait and have dinner tomorrow.
The joint has gone from the oven like that!"

Then the family would say,
"It's that horrible cat!
It was Mungojerrie or Rumpleteazer!"
And most of the time,
They left it at that.

Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer had a wonderful way
Of working together.
And some of the time you would say it was luck
And some of the time you would say it was weather.
They'd go through the house like a hurricane
And no sober person could take his oath.
Was it Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer?
Or could you have sworn that it mightn't be both?
When you heard a dining room smash
Or up from the pantry there came a loud crash.
Or down from the library came a loud ping
From a vase which was commonly said to be Ming.

Then the family would say, "Now which was which cat?
It was Mungojerrie and Rumpleteazer!"
And there's nothing at all to be done about that!

I believe it is Old Deuteronomy.

Well, of all things can it be really?
No! Yes! Ho! Hi! Oh, my eye!
My mind may be wandering, but I confess,
I believe it is Old Deuteronomy.

Old Deuteronomy's lived a long time.
He's a cat who has lived many lives in succession.
He was famous in proverb and famous in rhyme
A long while before Queen Victoria's accession.

Old Deuteronomy's buried nine wives
And more I am tempted to say ninety-nine.
And his numerous progeny prospers and thrives
And the village is proud of him in his decline.

At the sight of that placid and bland physiognomy
When he sits in the sun on the vicarage wall,
The oldest inhabitant croaks:

Well, of all things can it be really?
No! Yes! Ho! Hi! Oh, my eye!
My mind may be wandering, but I confess,
I believe it is Old Deuteronomy.

Well, of all things can it be really?
No! Yes! Ho! Hi! Oh, my eye!
My mind may be wandering, but I confess,
I believe it is Old Deuteronomy.

Well, of all things can it be really?
No! Yes! Ho! Hi! Oh, my eye!
My mind may be wandering, but I confess,
I believe it is Old Deuteronomy.

Well, of all things can it be really?
No! Yes! Ho! Hi! Oh, my eye!
My legs may be tottery, I must go slow
And be careful of Old Deuteronomy.

Of THE AWEFUL BATTLE
OF THE PEKES AND THE POLLICLES,
Together with some Account
Of the Participation
Of the Pugs and the Poms,
And the Intervention of the Great Rumpus Cat.

The Pekes and the Pollicles, everyone knows,
Are proud and implacable passionate foes;
It is always the same, wherever one goes.
And the Pugs and the Poms, although most people say
That they do not like fighting, yet once in a way.
They now and again join into the fray.

And they
Bark, bark, bark, bark.
Bark, bark, BARK, BARK.
Until you can hear them all over the Park.

Now on the occasion of which I shall speak
Almost nothing had happened for nearly a week
And that's a long time for a Pol or a Peke.
The big Police Dog was away from his beat -
I don't know the reason, but most people think
He'd slipped into the Wellington's Arms for a drink -
And no one at all was about on the street
When a Peke and a Pollicle happened to meet.

They did not advance or exactly retreat,
But they glared at each other, and scraped their hind feet.

And started to
Bark, bark, bark, bark.
Bark, bark, bark, bark.
Until you can hear them all over the Park.

And they
Bark, bark, bark, bark.
Bark, bark, BARK, BARK.
Until you can hear them all over the Park.

Now the Peke although people may say what they please,
Is no British Dog, but a Heathen Chinese.
And so all the Pekes, when they heard the uproar,
Some came to the window, some came to the door;
There were surely a dozen, more likely a score.
And together they started to grumble and wheeze
In their huffery-snuffery Heathen Chinese.
But a terrible din is what Pollicles like,
For your Pollicle Dog is a dour Yorkshire tyke.

And his braw Scottish cousins are snappers and biters,
And every dog-jack of them notable fighters;
And so they stepped out, with their pipers in order,
Playing When the Blue Bonnets Come Over the Border.
Then the Pug and the Poms held no longer aloof,
But some from the balcony, some from the roof,
Join to the din

With a
Bark, bark, bark, bark.
Bark, bark, BARK, BARK.
Until you can hear them all over the Park.

When these bold heroes together assembled,
The traffic all stopped, and the Underground trembled,
And some of the neighbours were so much afraid
That they started to ring up the Fire Brigade.
When suddenly, up from the a small basement flat,
Why who should stalk out but the GREAT RUMPUS CAT.

His eyes were like fireballs fearfully blazing,
He gave a great yawn, and his jaws were amazing;
And when he looked out through the bars of the area,
You never saw anything fiercer or hairier.
And what with the glare of his eyes and his yawning,
The Pekes and the Pollicles quickly took warning.
He looked at the sky and he gave a great leap -
And they every last one of them scattered like sheep.

Jellicle Cats and Dogs all must
Pollicle Dogs and Cats all must
Like undertakers come to dust!

Jellicle Cats come out tonight.
Jellicle Cats come one, come all.
The Jellicle Moon is shining bright.
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball.

Jellicle Cats are black and white.
Jellicle Cats are rather small.
Jellicle Cats are merry and bright.
And pleasant to hear when we caterwaul.

Jellicle Cats have cheerful faces.
Jellicle cats have bright black eyes.
We like to practice our airs and graces
And wait for the Jellicle Moon to rise.

Jellicle Cats develop slowly.
Jellicle cats are not too big.
Jellicle cats are roly-poly.
We know how to dance a Gavotte and a jig.

Until the Jellicle Moon appears,
Make our toilette and take our repose.
Jellicles wash behind their ears.
Jellicles dry between their toes.

Jellicle cats are black and white.
Jellicle cats are of moderate size.
Jellicles jump like a jumping jack.
Jellicle cats have moonlit eyes.

We're quiet enough in the morning hours.
We're quiet enough in the afternoon.
Reserving our terpsichorean powers
To dance by the light of the Jellicle Moon.

Jellicle cats are black and white.
Jellicle cats (as we said) are small.
If it happens to be a stormy night,
We will practice a caper or two in the hall.

If it happens the sun is shining bright,
You would say we had nothing to do at all.
We are resting and saving ourselves to be right
For the Jellicle Moon and the Jellicle Ball.

Jellicle cats come out tonight.
Jellicle cats come one, come all.
The Jellicle Moon is shining bright.
Jellicles come to the Jellicle Ball.

You see the border of her coat
Is torn and stained with sand.
And you see the corner of her eye twist
Like a crooked pin.

Silence.
Not a sound from the pavement.
Has the moon lost her memory?
She is smiling alone.
In the lamplight the withered leaves collect at my feet,
And the wind begins to moan.

Every street lamp seems to beat a fatalistic warning.
Someone mutters and the street lamp gutters
And soon it will be morning.

Memory.
All alone in the moonlight.
I can smile at the old days.
I was beautiful then.
I remember the time I knew what happiness was.
Let the memory live again.

The moments of happiness . . .
We had the experience, but missed the meaning,
And approach to the meaning restores the experience.
In a different form, beyond any meaning
We can assign to happiness . . .
. . . the past experience revived in the meaning
Is not the experience of one life only,
But of many generations - not forgetting
Something that is probably quite ineffable.

Moonlight
Turn your face to the moonlight.
Let your memory lead you.
Open up, enter in.
If you find there the meaning of what happiness is,
Then a new life will begin.

Gus is the cat at the theatre door.
His name, as I ought to have told you before
Is really Asparagus, but that's such a fuss
To pronounce, that we usually call him
Just Gus.

His coat's very shabby, he's thin as a rake.
And he suffers from palsy that makes his paw shake.
Yet he was in his youth quite the Smartest of Cats,
But no longer a terror to mice or to rats.

For he isn't the cat that he was in his prime.
Though his name was quite famous, he says, in his time.
And whenever he joins his friends at their club
(Which takes place at the back of the neighboring pub),
He loves to regale them, if someone else pays
With anecdotes drawn from his palmiest days.

For he once was a star of the highest degree.
He has acted with Irving, he's acted with Tree.
And he likes to relate his success on the halls
Where the gallery once gave him seven cat calls,
But his greatest creation as he loves to tell
Was Firefrorefiddle, the Fiend of the Fell.

"I have played in my time every possible part.
And I used to know seventy speeches by heart.
I'd extemporize backchat, I knew how to gag.
And I knew how to let the cat out of the bag.

"I knew how to act with my back and my tail.
With an hour of rehearsal, I never could fail.
I'd a voice that would soften the hardest of hearts,
Whether I took the lead, or in character parts.

"I have sat by the bedside of poor little Nell.
When the curfew was rung then I swung on the bell.
In the pantomime season, I never fell flat.
And I once understudied Dick Whittington's cat,
But my grandest creation, as history will tell.
Was Firefrorefiddle, the Fiend of the Fell."

Then if someone will give him a toothful of gin,
He will tell how he once played a part in East Lynne
At a Shakespeare performance, he once walked on pat
When some actor suggested the need for a cat.

"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained
As we did in the days when Victoria reigned.
They never get drilled in a regular troupe
And they think they are smart just to jump through a hoop."

And he says as he scratches himself with his claws.
"Well, theatre is certainly not what is was.
These modern productions are all very well,
But there's nothing to equal from what I hear tell.
That moment of mystery when I made history
As Firefrorefiddle, the Fiend of the Fell.

"I once crossed the stage on a telegraph wire
To rescue a child when a house was on fire.
And I think that I still can much better than most,
Produce blood-curdling noises to bring on the Ghost.

And I once played Growltiger.
Could do it again . . .
Could do it again . . .
Could do it again . . .

Growltiger's Last Stand

Growltiger was a Bravo Cat who travelled on a barge.
In fact, he was the roughest cat that ever roamed at large.
From Gravesend up to Oxford, he pursued his evil aims.
Rejoicing in his title of the 'Terror of the Thames.'

His manners and appearance did not calculate to please.
His coat was torn and seedy, it was baggy at the knees.
One ear was somewhat missing, no need to tell you why.
And he scowled upon a hostile world from one forbidding eye.

The cottagers of Rotherhithe knew something of his fame.
At Hammersmith and Putney, people shuddered at his name.
They would fortify the hen house, lock up the silly goose
When the rumor ran along the shore: Growltiger's on the loose!

Woe to the weak canary that fluttered from its cage,
Woe to the pampered Pekinese, that faced Growltiger's rage,
Woe to the bristly bandicoot that lurks on foreign ships,
And woe to any cat with whom Growltiger came to grips.

But most to cats of foreign race, his hatred had been vowed
To cats of foreign name and race, no quarter was allowed.
The Persian and the Siamese regarded him with fear.
Because it was a Siamese had mauled his missing ear.

Now on a peaceful summer night, all nature seemed at play.
The tender moon was shining bright, the barge at Molsey lay.
All in the balmy moonlight, it lay rocking on the tide.
And Growltiger was disposed to show his sentimental side.

Chi e la?
Mi amore!
So no qui.

In the forepeak of the vessel, Growltiger stood alone.
Concentrating my attention on the lady Griddlebone.
And my raffish crew were sleeping in their barrels and their bunks
As the Siamese came creeping in their sampans and their junks.

Growltiger had no eye or ear for aught, but Griddlebone,
And the Lady seemed enraptured by my manly baritone.
Disposed to relaxation and awaiting no surprise,
But the moonlight shone reflected from a thousand bright blue eyes.

And closer still and closer the Sampans circled 'round.
And yet from all the enemy there was not heard a sound.'
The foe was armed with toasting forks and cruel carving knives.
And the lovers sang their last duet in danger of their lives.

Oscillare in silenzio nel Vento profumato,
Dalla marea del naviglio serenamente cullato,
In quella tepida notte,
In quella tepida notte,
In quella tepida notte.

Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat
Table of contents

Macavity the Mystery Cat
Table of contents

Mr. Mistoffelees
Table of contents

Memory

Click here for another version of this song.

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The Journey to the Heaviside Layer
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The Ad-dressing of Cats
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