Today I saw a Vizsla tearing around a field, in search of whatever ecstasy of smells she was discovering, and I was reminded of my beloved Marika.
Without Dog
She won't eat,
drinks only small
sips from the bowl I hold
oiut to her.
Please, I say, please.
She attends earnestly,
panting, watching the air.
~
I learn to stick the neeedle
quickly. I learn
to do it in the dark.
One hand holds an IV bag
high, for pressure,
the other slips the needle in.
~
After a week
she walks again, around the block,
to the school yard.
No rules now--
I feed her hot dogs,
I feed her chicken fingers.
She runs in the woods.
~
And then one day
she won't lie down, won't
rest her head between her paws.
When I reach to stroke her
she startles and pulls away.
She keeps herself alert,
head raised, listening,
till she falls into an exhausted sleep
~
from which she wakes
to stagger around the room,
listing to one side,
bumping into walls.
Do you want to go outside?
I say. I say,
Let me give you the world.
~
UPS leaves a yellow slip in the door,
Sorry we missed you.
I stick it on the fridge
and when it falls to the floor
the sound of paper
fluttering
makes me turn and think
She's back.
~
I dream her young
and healthy
but still
she hesitates, outside
a dog door we never had
until she gathers herself
and leaps, landing
in our kitchen.
She scrapes her nails across the floor,
turns
and tries it again
and again,
what a show-off,
out, in--I can watch
forever, her body
poised
for the jump, then
launched, ears flapping--
out, in,
out.
(This poem oringally appeared in Tar River Poetry and then in my book, Dinner with Emerson.)