Dog Sitting

The dog won’t let me

type this tangled poem.

She’s doing what any other

dog would be doing at

this instance:

whining, yelping, walking back

& forth beside my feet,

parked at my writing desk.

This was an unfortunate time

to choose to scribe an epic.

If I was as wise as I pretend,

I would have surely

condensed this exercise

to the length of trite haiku.

Maybe it’s not too late.

Maybe I can ditch

the whole crust-of-the-

Earth kinda thing, the blight

from a brand-new virus,

the expulsion

of Hispanics

and that fifty-thousand

Gazans

no longer join the

rest of us in breath.

100,000 ears:

now deaf to the coo of doves

in chalky skies

Damn, it’s not quite

right—it surely needs

some sculpting, a refinement

of the words &

syllables,

but it’s something

that cannot happen

at the moment:

my guest that yaps

away, barking

in my earshot

that her truth means

more than mine

and always will:

her empty water

dish, the fact her

bladder’s full,

her treats upon the

floor like broken

bones.

Andreas Gripp

April 16, 2025

RF Image