Red: A Poetry Collection

Just a Dog for Just a Girl

I locked eyes with the Greyhound
locked away in the pound
and felt his prison sentence
as I felt my own:
Useless, discarded, and starving,
as if by surviving for eleven years
we were both asking for too much.

And the world was waiting,
impatiently,
for us to stop wasting its time,
its annoyance evident in the sighs
of the summer breeze,
and in the glare of the midday sun.

I knew I had to save him.

Time stopped for months
as Stretch and I borrowed
sun-filled days,
when my earth-worn barefoot feet
carried me like wings
across lush Bermuda fields and under
smatterings of pecan trees.

My lithe and wiry hound,
as wispy as the wind in my hair,
bounded with joy beside me,
reveling together in the escape
from our prisons,
and just for a moment
tasted freedom-

And we could not be touched.

But like all things borrowed,
return is inevitable-
for I was never a thief,
and I knew the cruelty of the world.

So I wasn't surprised at all
when Stretch became ill,
and one night he seized
collapsing in the driveway
across the rocks where we often played.

Mom came out with a gun,
screen door slamming shut like a tomb,
but in the end she couldn't shoot,
and as Stretch yelped in pain
I gently took the rifle away
from Mom's trembling grasp
and gave her the flashlight instead.

If dogs are man's best friend
what is to be said
of little girls,
dirty and damaged and bereft,
for in wanting a little love
saved a dog from death,
but in the end
must dole it out herself?

As I raised the rifle,
taking aim at my best friend's head,
I thought of the nights
I trembled with fear
and Stretch,
taking up my bed,
kissing away my tears
as if licking his own wounds instead.

Now he was the one suffering.

And there remained one way to save him,
for he was just a dog, and I- just a girl,
so with the smallest of courage I braced,
and with the meager flicker
of my trembling finger
a minuscule piece of lead-
loaded with sorrow,
but dispatched with love,
took less than a second
to terminate our friendship forever.

I picked him up off the rocks
and carried him, hollow and heavy,
for thirty minutes in the dark,
until I collapsed to my knees
to rest in our favorite spot,
beneath our favorite trees;
and when I returned,
covered in mud and blood,
I crumpled into bed,
infinitely older,
with only the stars for company.

Author's Note:

It's easy for me to write about fictional characters, but hard to put my own story into words. This is a true story. I saved a greyhound from a pound when I was eleven. I named him Stretch, and he was my friend and confidant for a bit during a dark and difficult time in my life. After some months, he contracted distemper and began seizing terribly one night. We lived twelve miles in the country, it was late at night, and the only merciful thing was to put him down. Mom tried but was overcome with grief, so out of love for her and Stretch I did the only thing I could.

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