Poem...

A bit on the anxious side today...and feeling like a wimp. Will explain more later. For now here is a poem I really like by Carl Dennis. Such fantastic language.


The God of Dogs

Billions of years had to pass before the concern
And vigilance of the god of dogs
Made themselves manifest and a wet mutt
Could sleep by the stove while a winter wind
Banged the shutters. So many eons of preparation
Before our planet cooled and crusted.
So long a stretch before the first clouds opened
To moisten the burning marl, the first rain
Slowly filling the low spots to make an ocean
Or shallow inlet, or landlocked pool
Where the earliest speck of life was warmed into being.
And then the teeming waters and the pioneer species
Edging up on the sand so their descendents could serve
As the earliest ancestors of dogs and humans.
The day a dog pack and band of hunters
Ventured to share their gifts —dog nose, man spear —
Marked a big step in the plans of the god of dogs,
Like the winter night a dog first edged into camp
And found it cozier than the woods because the dog god
Had done his ground work, first endowing humans
With the wits to construct a lean-to and build a fire.
And then the snug teepee, sod house, log house,
Clapboard A-frame plastered against the drafts.
By the time the village became a city
Too far from the woods for hunting, the god of dogs
Had spiked the human gene pool with an extra
Tincture of loneliness so that even a dog
Asleep by the stove provided some company
On blustery nights when the dark felt menacing.
And to keep the master from infecting his dog
With human fears, the far-sighted god
Provided him with the gift of self-distraction.
It’s time to clean the attic again.
It’s time to cull the shelves, removing the books
He hasn’t opened in years to make room for new ones.
By then the sun’s up and the dog’s awake,
Eager for a frisk in the park and the sudden
Concert of odors that welcomes its kind
Into a paradise that would make the master jealous,
Anxious to shorten the walk and get back to work,
If the god of dogs hadn’t thought to provide his kind
With a knack for metaphor. “This literal park,”
The master reasons,“might well betoken
A park of the spirit that waits to receive me.”
And then he muses about its whereabouts,
Losing himself in the kind of cloudy question
That the god of dogs prompts his species to cherish
So the dog has time to sniff in the bushes
Or tree a squirrel. And then, if needed, the question
If he’ll know his paradise when he finds it,
Or only later, looking back.

Carl Dennis, "Unknown Friends", 2007