Tobit Walked with Dog (9/12/11)

               for John and Maddie

We truly mourn the dead when a dog dies.

Soft-spoken, Swiss grandfathers passed away

In nursing home chairs,

Neighbors’ toothy-grinning sisters

In creek drownings:

It is in dog-deaths that the Deluge comes.

It is when our blue-eyed Huskies

Slip through the dog-door

To die amongst boughs of pine

And our Aussies

Shake off their belled bandanas for the last time:

Verily, bereft

Of saintly love and sinless life. 

And when we bury their remains under

Backyard aspens,

Or reverence their ashes in little painted pots,

We know

That in their eyes

We beheld the look of God,

And

In their tail-thumping,

We heard the might

Of angel’s wings.