Born twelve years ago today one of nine

gone last June my companion all those years.

who knows what this meant to you? member

of our pack alert to verbal signal and to food

did you love me? does it matter? You were

well behaved almost always but the but

made you your own being. The walk when

you bounded from leash grasp disappeared

into a back yard disappeared gone phhht

until I was limp with weeping. Escaped

out the Toyota door, me in the bookstore

shoe store owner called me to fetch you.

the day you and Nikki stole the cooling

pork loin off a countertop ate all but garlic

cloves spit out on the floor. Coming home

to you lying by the door we'd know you

had sinned, find an unopened bread

loaf on your bed or garbage scattered

across the kitchen. Bought you a lumbar-

support dog bed came upstairs

to the livingroom recarpeted in rent foam

you ran off at Houghton Beach, over 120

pounds. I felt you let me wrestle you to

ground and I said Bad girl. No. No run.