A lot of people don’t realize Lovecraft had a sentimental side. As I shared last year, it seems around Christmas he would often spend time writing some pretty sappy poetry. Well, thanks to the wonderful resource of the H.P. Lovecraft Archive this year I get to share a few more of his silly little Christmas poetry with you. In these Christmas Greetings, Lovecraft writes a few short poems for his friends and their cats.

Christmas Greetings To Eugene B. Kuntz et al.

May good St. Nick, like as a bird of night,

Bring thee rich blessings in his annual flight;

Long by thy chimney rest his pond’rous pack,

And leave with lessen’d weight upon his back!

Christmas Greetings to Laurie A. Sawyer

As Christmas snows (as yet a poet’s trope)

Call back one’s bygone days of youth and hope,

Four metrick lines I send—they’re quite enough

Tho’ once I fancy’d I could write the stuff!

Christmas Greetings to Sonia H. Greene

Once more the ancient feast returns,

And the bright hearth domestic burns

With Yuletide’s added blaze;

So, too, may all your joys increase

Midst floods of mem’ry, love, and peace,

And dreams of Halcyon days.

Christmas Greetings to Rheinhart Kleiner

St. John, whose art sublimely shines

In liquid odes and melting lines,

Let Theobald his regard express

In verse of lesser loveliness.

As now in regal state appear

The festive hours of Yuletide cheer,

My strongest wish is that you may

Feel ev’ry blessing of the day!

Christmas Greetings to Felis (Frank Belknap Long’s cat)

Little Tiger, burning bright

With a subtle Blakeish light,

Tell what visions have their home

In those eyes of flame and chrome!

Children vex thee—thoughtless, gay—

Holding when thou wouldst away:

What dark lore is that which thou,

Spitting, mixest with thy meow?

Christmas Greetings to Annie E. P. Gamwell

As when a pigeon, loos’d in realms remote,

Takes instant wing, and seeks his native cote,

So speed my blessings from a barb’rous clime

To thee and Providence at Christmas time!

Christmas Greetings to Felis (Frank Belknap Long’s cat) #2

Haughty Sphinx, whose amber eyes

Hold the secrets of the skies,

As thou ripplest in thy grace,

Round the chairs and chimney-place,

Scorn on thy patrician face:

Hiss not harsh, nor use thy claws

On the hand that gives applause—

Good-will only doth abide

In these lines at Christmastide!

Man, Lovecraft had a soft spot for Frank Belknap Long’s cat. Felis better have appreciated both those little poems. But, like most cats, I’m sure he was probably indifferent and a little smug.

I hope you enjoyed reading these silly little poems as much as I did. It’s always enjoyable looking into a different side of a writer like Lovecraft. So much of his work is mired in his xenophobic fears it’s always interesting to see something that is the complete opposite of his more known work. It shows the complexity inherent in a person.

[!] UPDATE: My rad little sister sent me a picture of Lovecraft holding his buddy Felis. I figured since we just read two poems for him, it’d be great to see a pic as well. So here they are broin’ down: