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My sister in law is creating a poem where she is using the word cattle. We are stuck because the line goes: “Where cattle graze miles away from the city”

We are unsure if the correct form of graze to use is graze or grazes. Because when we read it out loud the word grazes naturally comes out but is it ungrammatical to use grazes with the word cattle?

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    I graze, you graze, he grazes, we graze, you graze they graze. A cow grazes, cattle graze. – Hot Licks Sep 30 '19 at 01:36
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    @HotLicks Are you on one of those fad diets? – Cascabel_StandWithUkraine_ Sep 30 '19 at 01:49
  • @Cascabel -- The cattle is lowing??? – Hot Licks Sep 30 '19 at 01:58
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    Poetry don't have to stick to no grammar. – J. Taylor Sep 30 '19 at 02:07
  • https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=cattle+is%2Ccattle+are&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Ccattle%20is%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ccattle%20are%3B%2Cc0#t1%3B%2Ccattle%20is%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Ccattle%20are%3B%2Cc0 – Hot Licks Sep 30 '19 at 02:12
  • And if you look at the "hits", virtually all uses of "cattle is" are in sentences like "The iron requirement of cattle is believed to be less than that of swine." – Hot Licks Sep 30 '19 at 02:13
  • Hi Jessica, does "Cows graze" feel okay? It really is the same thing. – aparente001 Sep 30 '19 at 03:48
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    @Cascabel Although you're right that cattle is an uncountable mass noun that therefore requires "partitive" constructions like ten head of cattle for counting, it turns out that unlike nearly all such mass nouns, cattle is actually one of those famed "pluralia tantum" which by definition necessarily have no singular and take plural concord: those cattle are stampeding. You may be thinking of words like Spanish ganado or rebaño, which are both much less exotic grammatically than English cattle. – tchrist Sep 30 '19 at 04:53
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    @J.Taylor Poets it sticks to no grammar / Hit word with the liter'ry hammer / As long as they rhyme / We no give a dime / 'Cause in it we are for the glamour – marcellothearcane Sep 30 '19 at 06:35
  • Here's an identical question: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/3326/can-cattle-be-singular – Stuart F Sep 30 '19 at 11:24
  • @tchrist I know that it should be "cattle graze"...I'm not sure what I was thinking when I wrote that. Blame it on too much whisky at a friend's 75th B'day – Cascabel_StandWithUkraine_ Sep 30 '19 at 14:13

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