Tracking
July 27 2016


The dog is a sundial
following the day as it circles the deck.
Flopping down in the patch of heat
her chest rises and falls,
hot breath
cooling the blood. 

An eye opens, tail thumps
as I approach.
But an old dog 
lying in the sun
will only be moved
by cloud, cataclysm
food.

Small children, and other innocent creatures
sleep like this,
immersed, and utterly unquestioning. 
I bargain
calculate the hours
toss with anxiety.
But sleep is her default
and she is effortless.

Her body stiffens, legs thrash.
Excited yelps
escape her throat.
Doggie dreams 
are not existential, or filled with angst;
they are chasing rabbits, running with the pack.
Or perhaps, trailing me.
A trusting companion, awaiting my command,
dogged in her constancy. 

So I let sleeping dogs lie.
Her thick brown coat
lightening to blondish,
one half-open eye
tracking my every move. 



A long time since I let myself write a dog poem. I think the key word here is constancy. It conveys exactly what we love about our dogs:  their  loyalty and fidelity, their sure companionship. 

It’s clear that the narrator envies his dog, and this shouldn’t be surprising. Because we have much to learn from them:  their ability to live in the moment; their unconditional and nonjudgmental love; their lack of vanity (not to mention lack of  materialism); their unfiltered and uninhibited enthusiasm. And also their unerring integrity. By this I mean how true and consistent they are to their essential dogginess. Because unlike us, they do not question, manage impressions, or pretend to be someone they’re not. And, of course, we envy their ignorance of death. Because even though our awareness of mortality gives life its urgency and ambition, ignorance seems an enviable kind of freedom. 

I often use cliche ironically. But even when it’s not ironic, cliche seems to have an attraction for me. Maybe it’s because poetry is so carefully constructed -- each word weighed, the cadence and music so obsessively tuned (even though, ideally, it appears effortless!) -- that a cliche is almost like taking a deep cleansing breath. Or maybe it’s the challenge of interrogating a tired cliche in a way that reinvigorates its meaning, gives it new life. Anyway, I quite like let sleeping dogs lie. It reads so seamlessly in a literal sense that its familiarity, once the line is done, almost comes as a surprise. I’m amused by this, and hope the reader is as well. 

The opening stanza came to me out on the trail, walking with Skookum, word for word (with just a little tweaking). Walking is an excellent invitation to poetry, but hasn’t been happening much lately. This writing of this poem was was also very unusual in being done directly on the keyboard. I’ve always felt that the tactility of pen on paper was very helpful to the creative process. But clearly, not essential!