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The Dogs
by Helen Mort
The Dogs - Helen Mort
The Dogs
Some mornings, waking up between the sandy whippet
and the black, their breathing slow as mine,
their eyes more sorrowful, I remind myself I’m not a dog.
It’s not acceptable to taste the grass or roll in moss until
I’m musked with it. There are deer in the woods I’ll never see.
My thirst discriminates. It does not have me bend
my grateful head to puddles, gutters, hollows
in the rock. I don’t track rabbits in my sleep.
I’ll not know love like theirs, observed in mute proximity
and if I sometimes sit bolt upright after dark, sensing
a movement in the yard, it’s only that I’ve learned
a little of their vigilance. I’m not like them:
one night I’ll set off past the meadow, down
behind the beck, beyond the blunt profile of Silver Howe
and nobody will call me back.
from Division Street (Chatto & Windus, 2013), © Helen Mort 2013, used by permission of the author.