The tiger, according to Valéry, is a grandiose fact, a veritable institution, a highly organized power, a kind of raison d’état, totalitarian monarchy; an absolutist animal. For these and other reasons, it is clear: le tigre ce n’est pas moi.

*

The tiger, mammal (sic) of the regal Felidae family, calculates its acts with extreme rigor; it doesn’t redraft,  go back on its word, make corrections. The tiger keeps its own time. Diurnal even at night.

*

William Blake was right to marvel: what immortal eye might dare to craft the fearful symmetry of the tiger; or whether the tiger could please the same God who created the Lamb.

*

The tiger will devour your metaphor before you finish it. The tiger waits for no man. The gods wait on the tiger.

*

The tiger is a caliper in the form of a tiger.

*

The tiger has no deputy. The lion is the vice-tiger.

*

The tiger: so well-put-together that even paper tigers are to be feared.

 *

Would it slight the majesty of this ultimate animal, to allude to the tigerishness of the Stalin-Hitler double act?

*

The tiger is a cosmotiger.

*

The tiger is handsome. Unavoidable. Sibylline. Calm. Untransferable.

The tigress of eternity advances upon me in the form of a pair of scissors.

Atropos.

Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash