i'll never be a poet

ageless creature

- debutante slouch:

- all cradle-like, foetal

- potato baby.

- circle of life / earthworms slide out, newborns on the grass

- you're a big baby. you really are, big baby.

- you stand up and hobble off, lame in your back leg

- you crane towards home with the strength of a working horse, neck muscles straining against leash

- i say no, we've got to go to the bus stop, listen to me

- your doe eyes shrink, eyelids lowered over them. you stare at me with a pressurised ocular beam, the chocolate milk brown turning a sharp almond and you shrink me- i'm a child, you're sagely and your glare says you know better. a proverb floats through the air, rustles the trees, speaks all around:

- from dust you came, to dust you will return.

- i shake the shiver of the breeze off and stand up straight

- no, i say, let's go.

- i scoop up your eggs and feed them to the bus stop bin. your eyes have grown large again, looking up at me. you turned your limp into a stiff-legged trot, a passable sprightly gait that hurtles down the hill past my pace sometimes.

- at home, you melt into a sealskin of breathing fur, eyes closed and invisible. i can't see anything from your face. 

- this is your pause from time, your space between ages. 

(poem about my dog pooping again)