We Are Siamese If You Please

Can a modern poet be shaman,

even without wearing a bardic tunic?
There are no better cats than I am.

Well, when you anoint yourself with balsam,
it can feel extremely therapeutic
to intone your strong convictions like a shaman.

You’ll be in the neighborhood when the daemon
leaps, when everyone receives the rubric:
There are no better cats than I am.

And you get to hold a shining flamen
and be oracular like a Druid—
that’s the entitlement of a shaman.

So much is necessarily unclear to the layman,
whose job is to sit still and hold a tulip—
There are no better cats than I am.

Well, Holy Rumi and Shams, Batman!
Put on your rouge, put on your lipstick!
Can a modern poet be a shaman?
There are no better cats than I am.