On a telegraph wire the birds were sitting in a bunch
He saw an even number,said he'd have 'em for his lunch
Climbed softly up the pole until he reached the top
Put his foot upon the 'lectric wire, tied him in a knot

This cat had company out in the backyard
Somebody threw a boot and threw it awful hard
Hit the cat behind the ear and he thought it was a slight
And down came a brick and knocked him out of sight

They threw him in the kennel where the dog was asleep
And the bones of cats lay piled in a heap
That kennel burst apart and the dog flew out the side
With his ears chewed off and holes in his hide

They sneaked him in a shop with the butcher not around
And they dropped him in the hopper where the meat was ground
The cat despaired with a blood-curdling shriek
And that shops hamburger tasted furry for a week

They put him in a cotton sack and gave him to a girl
Who'd started on a bicycle all around the world
Well, over there in China a terrible wreak was found
She's singing now in heaven with the angels all around

Now this cat was a terror and they thought it would be best
To give him to a feller who was going way out west
Train ran round a curve and hit a broken rail
Not a blessed soul aboard that train lived to tell the tale

The cat was a possessor of a family all its own
With seven little kittens till there was a cyclone
Blew the houses all apart and tossed the cat around
The air was full of kittens and not a one was found

Away across the ocean they did send the cat at last
Vessel only out a day and taking water fast
People all began to pray, the boat began to toss
A great big gust of wind came by and every soul was lost

They gave the cat to a man in a balloon
And told him to give him to the man in the moon
But the balloon it busted and everybody said
Ten miles away they picked the man up dead

At last they found a way this cat to really fix
They put him in an orange crate on highway 66
Come a ten ton truck with a twenty ton load
Scattered pieces of that orange crate a mile down the road

They put him on a boat bound for Sidneytown
They thought with all that rain there he'd surely drowned
When the rain came down for the 92nd day
That whole darn city just a floated out the bay

The farmer on the corner said he'd shoot that cat on sight
Loaded up his shotgun full of nails and dynamite
And he hid in the garden till the cat came round
But 97 pieces of that man were all they found

They put him on the White House lawn, I'll tell the reason why
With all the golfballs flying, they thought he'd surely die
Well the very next morning, what do you think they found
64 squirrels lying dead upon the ground

Gave him to a little boy with a dollar note
Who was going out to sea in an open boat
They tied a rock around his neck, it must have weighed a pound
Now they're dragging up the river, cause the little boy was drowned

They took him down to Cape Canaveral and they put him into place
And they shot him in a satellite way up into space
They thought that the cat was beyond human reach
And then they got a phone call from Miami Beach

An H bomb fell just the other day,
A bomb fell in the very same way
Russia went, England went, then the USA
The whole human race gone without a chance to pray.

But the cat came back - the very next day.

The cat came back!  

We thought he was a gonner,

but the cat came back.

He just wouldn't stay away.