For Pup
We were traveling together
when you took the turning
where the Disappeared go,
and are seen no more.
I could not follow. The way was barred.
Still, I continued walking,
carrying your soul with me
in a small wooden box,
hidden under my cape,
held close to my heart.
When I tire, and falter,
am tempted to turn back,
I can hear you thumping inside your box.
You will not let me
abandon the journey.
(Asleep, she found herself
crossing a barren desert.
There was a river ahead,
and she could hear voices, singing,
coming around the bend.
They were coming to get her,
but then she came back into her body.
Not time, yet.)
Death is a river, turbulent, roaring
through time-worn rock-walled chasms
green with weeping.
It dashes our brains out on the rocks
so the eagles may feed,
then settles us, lighter and relieved
of our earthly burden,
in rippled ponds along the shore,
where beaver and wolves
may find us.
I will meet you there
at twilight
on the last day.
At midnight, a ghostly specter
glides mistily along the shore.
She is beckoning,
but I pretend that I am blind.
She is calling.
I pantomime that I am deaf
and cannot hear.
Not time, yet.
These words are a pathway
between the time when you were here
and now.
They are as full of your absence
as my heart.
I am still traveling.
You always did go before me on the path.
I am getting just a little closer.
Not time, yet. Not yet.
I wrote this in 2014. Sharing at earthweal's open link.
As always, the special quality that your poems about pup always hold. First thing I read this morning..and I am so glad I did.
ReplyDeleteSo sad yet so wonderful. Your love for your dog is inspiring.
ReplyDeleteSorry - I forgot to add - anonymous is Suzanne - Mapping Uncertainty
ReplyDeleteA powerful love and its loss is such a bridge between -- many believe they will be rejoined with their loved ones on the other side, but here the loss stays with the living, even though the crossing feels close. And years later, the same is so. This poem is also a profound meditation on absence and presence, how both are bound and found in something so preciously lost.
ReplyDeleteYour heartfelt poem is a testament to the deep bond you had/have with pup. I believe his spirit still watches over you. A bond like that is otherworldly. Wishing you peace my friend!
ReplyDelete