Black Dog
I
contemplate the worst that humans can endure.
Hard labour, a Gulag in Siberia, for instance.
Think of only one —
too many would make it worse,
this depression, the name it is known by these days,
that makes me feel that I am dead.
Shamed and pained as I am in fact living.
Think of them, the political prisoners —
if they can survive, so must I.
It is not nearly so cold here and the labour is not so hard,
it only seems like it is.
The loneliness of how it is to speak
a different language that no one understands;
to have come from some strange place
that no one has heard of.
Except they do and they have. I am right here,
invisible among them.
The dog next door, a large black Labrador,
he barks at me whenever he sees me.
It is a 'Come over here! I too am alone'
kind of bark.
I lift my heavy feet, walk, and push my concrete hand
through the wire fence.
He sniffs my hand and places his big paw on my arm.
Dogs can smell sadness.
I place my hand on his broad head.
He looks up into my eyes as if I am
the most wondrous creature he has ever seen.
He wants me to stay, to pat him,
talk to him.
I have no god to beg to be loved.
But I have this dog with eyes that are deep wells
and the truth is in there as it is in all that lives.
I cannot help that the people here
worship inanimate objects.
They look at my clothes, my house, my car
and don't see me.
The black dog and I search the winter land.
Something builds.
Is it a soul, that feels like it is coming alive?
