Category Archives: Cats & Dogs

An Ode to Dog Companions

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The Prompt: Literate for a Day—Someone or something you can’t communicate with through writing  can understand every single word you write today, for one day only. What do you tell them?

An Ode to Dog Companions

Darling little Frida, dearest Diego, too.
I have a little something I have to say to you.
If you’d like to go out walking every single day,
you have to start responding when I shout out, “Hey!”

That word means “Pay attention!” Its volume says “Right now!”
It doesn’t mean to take off after every passing cow
pulling me right after you, cause it is two to one,
and since my last foot surgery, I don’t much like to run!

Another little something I’d really like to tell
is that it was all your fault the last time that I fell.
When one of you runs toward the lake, the other towards the town,
your leashes wrap around me and the way I go is down!

Please don’t jump up on the screen whenever mealtime’s near.
I’ve had it mended more than once—a dozen times, I fear.
If you sit there quietly, your meal will be served fast.
I tell this to you each day, but my words don’t seem to last.

Another little something that needs badly to be said
is that it would be lovely if you’d shit behind the shed
instead of on the footpath or all over the grass,
for pooping over everything is really rather crass.

You don’t have to answer that dog across the street,
for he sets a barking record that you don’t have to beat.
The fighting cocks can crow without your high accompaniment.
(Albeit that your howls are growing quite magnificent.)

The hound of the Baskervilles was acting on a curse
and now that you have matched him, there’s no need to rehearse.
The owl will hoot hoot every night no matter what you do.
Ignore him, please. This is your mother begging it of you!

The dog food is for you dogs, and the cat food is for cats.
If you keep forgetting this, it’s going to drive me bats!
It does no good to try to knock cat dishes from the wall.
Those antics will not ever get you anywhere at all!

Diego, when I get home, please don’t drive Frida away!
You won’t believe there’s love enough, no matter what I say.
I have one hand for each of you, so let her have her share.
You are a dog and not a pig, so gluttony’s not fair.

Please don’t eat the cat bed and please don’t chase the cat.
Bullying’s not an answer. I will have none of that!
You found me on the street and did all that you could do
to make me bring you home with me to join my motley crew.

I am allergic to you dogs, and also to each cat,
although I know that you cannot be cognizant of that.
And so you want to sleep real near and have me stroke you often.
But when I do, it ends in itching, nose-blowing and coughin’.

Your species is a puzzle to which I don’t have a key.
Though it was at your insistence that I brought you home with me,
why is it every single time an open gate you see,
you’re through it, running down the street, so anxious to be free?

(for a similar prose answer to this prompt, go Here)

Justification

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Justification

I spent all day in town today for business and for pleasure,
so by the time I got back home, I felt I’d had full measure
of driving-selling-trying on, shopping-eating-walking;
so I just thought I’d have some time that didn’t include talking.
I put my suit on thinking I would jump right in the pool,
but then the cat began to whine, the dogs commenced to drool—
sure signals it was feeding time—in this they were united.
They’ve learned their human serves their supper faster when invited.

The problem was, the dog food was still up in the car,
so I ran out to get it. (It wasn’t very far.)
I fed the dogs and cat, then found new flea collars I’d bought,
and so, of course, I had to put new collars on the lot.
Then, finally, the pool was mine—aerobic exercise
kept my body busy while a movie wooed my eyes
to disregard the time that passed while bending, kicking, flopping,
for when I am distracted, I am less intent on stopping.

With no prompt to finish early, I just went on and on.
Two hours passed so quickly that the setting of the sun
(and the ending of the movie—I guess I must admit)
finally gave the signal that it was time to quit.
But as I climbed the ladder, something poked my breast—
something sharp and lumpy that had made a little nest
there between my cleavage all my hours in the pool;
and when I drew it out you can’t image what a fool

I felt like, for this faux pas cannot help but win the prize
of all the times that I’ve done stupid things in any guise.
As teacher, daughter, writer, artist, sister, lover, friend,
I’ve committed stupid acts impossible to mend.
But this one takes the cake, I’m sure, as stupidest by far.
I’ve told you how I went to get the pet food from the car,
then fed and put flea collars on protesting dogs and cat.
(I doubt you’d do much better when dealing with all that!)

When I went out to do all this, I didn’t want to lose ‘em.
That’s why my car keys (with remote) wound up within my bosom!


Try as we may, those little indicators of age will sneak up on us.  There is no plastic surgery for a sagging memory!!!  (The Prompt today was:  “Age is just a number,” says the well-worn adage. But is it a number you care about, or one you tend (or try) to ignore?”)

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Wonder of wonders, when I put the key in the ignition the next morning, it worked!!! Saved on this one!

The Dogs Are Barking (May 19,2013)

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The Dogs Are Barking

They break the morning––a daily rite.
It’s just a warning. The dogs won’t bite.
Two strangers talk but pass unseen.
I doze, they walk, with a wall between.
I lie here posed between thought and sleep.
My eyes still closed. I’m swimming deep.

I resist the trip––that journey up––
preferring to sip from the dreaming cup
whose liquid darker and bitter thick
reveals a starker bailiwick
than schedules, crafts, menus, schemes.
Much finer draughts we quaff in dreams.

I try to sink back into sleep,
once more to drink of waters deep;
but the dogs still bark. They leap and pace.
My dreams too dark for this morning place.
Those dreams lie deep and intertwined,
wanting to creep back up my mind.

But its slippery slope is much inclined
and provides small hope that I will find
again, that world well out of sight
where truth lies curled, still holding tight––
as oysters cleave and then unfurl
with mighty heave, the priceless pearl

of that other mind that slips the knife
beneath the rind of our daily life.
Time is a brew of present, past
and future, too—whatever’s cast
to stew and steep the story rare
that’s buried deep in dreams laid bare.

Dreams are stories we tell ourselves
that draw our quarries to bookstore shelves.
Pinned to the page, they reach their height
and bring our sage self to the light.
But the dogs are barking. They’re hungry, cross.
When I rise to feed them, the poem is lost.

Uncaught, dismembered, it blows away.
Like petals, scattered in the light of day.

The Drop of the Third Shoe

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We have been told our electricity (and thus, our water) will be off all day, so I’ve filled all the sinks and the tub and every pitcher in the house with water to aid in rehydration, flushing and dirty dishwashing.  Now, an hour and a half past the time I was told we’d lose power, we still have it.  Strangely enough, last night I found my bedroom door was permanently locked and could not be opened by key or turning the knob.  Same was true of my back door…and my kitchen door knob is about to fall off.  I finally had to take my bedroom door off the hinges as I had to go outside to get from my bedroom to the rest of my house.  Everything seems to be going on strike at once.  I’m waiting for the third shoe to drop.

Update:  Give me a hammer!  Give me a screwdriver! Give me an ice pick! Give me some WD-40!  Give me some muscle! Give me two magazines and one copy of Three Cups of Deceit (which is exactly the same thickness as the crack under my bedroom door).  And what have you got?  S-U-C-C-E-S-S!!!!!  I fixed both of my doors.  Took one off the hinges, rejigged the doorknob (thanks, ice pick), WD-40’d it excessively, realigned the door with a lot of muscle and various combinations of the book and magazines and hammer, and got the pins back in and the lock works—and opens!  The back door just took WD-40 and the hammer.  I’m still not so sure that someone didn’t try to jimmy it open as I had to pound the lock plate back flat, but—the third shoe that dropped was, I hope, the fact that I did two of the repairs myself and I am now able to freely move through my house…. Applause, please.  Comments will do!

The offending door, dismantled

The offending door, dismantled

And Diego zipped into the open door, ran to his cage, nosed the door open and slept through the entire thing. This is not punishment. He loves his little cage--for sleeping only. He is a puppy and still has the chews.

The repaired door, back on its hinges.

And Diego zipped into the open door, ran to his cage, nosed the door open and slept through the entire thing. This is not punishment. He loves his little cage--for sleeping only. He is a puppy and still has the chews.

And Diego zipped into the open door, ran to his cage, nosed the door open and slept through the entire thing. This is not punishment. He loves his little cage–for sleeping only. He is a puppy and still has the chews.