Are we really cats if we don’t
have tails? We are if we are Manxes.
Scrissags! Scrawls! Sleetchy old scrapers!
Hibernators! Castletown snots!
Big slugs, all sitting on our
shillings with our little crab wives
snurly and high. Cranberries dripping
down our chins Ayr ain t’ayns niau,
Casherick dy row dt’ennym. Have stained
our pilgrim suits! The expression for swallow is
_gollan ny geayee_: the fork of the wind.
We ate too much Manxgiving day
But we don’t give a hoot. We’re creepers, clicks,
clinkers, clukes, crooils, reezaghs, shliawns, slebbies, sleetches!
Us cats can actually be drawn with a series of circles!
We slurp a pile of dressing, gobble down turkey thighs,
Dy jig dty reeriaght. Dt’aigney dy row jeant er y thalloo,
We dribble messy cranberries onto the bleihs, blebs, dawds,
flids, gapings, glashans, gogaws, gorms, hessians, kinawns,
loobans, ommidhans, slampies, sthahls, wallopers. We devour
some pumpkin pie. myr t’ayns niau.Cur dooin nyn arran
jiu as gagh laa, as leih dooin nyn loghtyn! We have very round heads
and rounded cheeks which gives us a jowly appearance;
Within us on this special day/ It’s thankful hearts that beat,
so thankful for all the peevish people, especially small scolding women:
borraghs, coughties, crabbies, cretchies, corodanks,
gob-mooars, gonnags, grangans, grinnders, grouws, huffies,
mhinyags, pootchaghs, scrissies, scrowls, smullaghs,
spiddaghs, targes. We’re thankful for all the things that we
enjoy/ But mainly for the eats. For we are high in the hindquarters!
with back legs much longer than the forelegs! thus causing
our rumps to be higher than our shoulders!
Happy Manxgiving!
Otohime 