I feed him eggs. When my mother’s back is
turned I open the refrigerator
and swipe an egg or two and hide them in
my overalls pockets and take them with
the bowl of kibble (we keep the dog chow
under the sink, with the dishwashing soap
and sponges and toilet plunger and steel
wool and bug-killer and Father’s chewing
tobacco) up the kitchen steps, then through
the living room, then onto the back porch
and through the screen door, then down the steps to
the back yard. He’s prancing like a buck deer.
I put the dish on the edge of the dry
well and fish the eggs from my pockets and
crack them carefully – though he’d eat the shells,
too – and watch the yolks drop like two glass eyes
into his Jim Dandy. I take a stick
and stir the chow and eggs until they goo
together. Sit, I command. Boy, does he,
quick and balanced and without that goofy
dog-grin that he gives me when I try to
teach him a new trick (yesterday it was
roll over – each time I tried to help him
he thought I was reaching to pet him and
licked my hand before I could even roll
him halfway over. Stupid dog, I say.
How hard can it be?) He reminds me of
those soldiers in the movies and TV.
They snap-to with a Yes, sir! or No, sir!
or an I want to be a Marine, Sir!
Then I lower the bowl but he stays at
attention until I say, Okay let’s
eat. Then he’s a dog again, or maybe
a wolf. Or at least a wild dog. Before
I can drop the broken bits down the well
he’s pushing with his hand licking the bowl
across the yard. Sometimes I look over
the edge—it’s getting pale down there now with
those fragments, all those chicks come to nothing.
But he needs the protein and we don’t leave
many scraps for him after supper. My,
we sure do eat a lot of eggs, Mother
says. It’s as if they just disappear. Yeah,
I say. Maybe they sprouted wings and flew
away. Sometimes I steal the bacon grease,
pour some of the drippings over his feed
while she’s not looking. It’s good for his coat.
Or I’ll strip the fat off a few slices
and hide them in my napkin and save it
to supplement his kibble. Even cheese,
that sliced and processed yecch I never eat
anyway. I’m not wasting it – he gets
my share. At Sunday School God says, Thou shalt
not steal. I do but it’s for a good cause,
so how can it be stealing? I don’t take
things for myself, except cookies. What’s God
care for cookies? They’re not even homemade
and they’re not good for him, the dog, I mean,
so it’s smart that I keep them for myself.
I’d never do anything to hurt him
-- still the dog, I mean. At the bottom of
the well the bad place is paved all in white.
It’s the color of Heaven, upside down.
I’m not sure what I’ll do when it fills up
-- walk on eggshells, I guess, till they’re tramped down,
then fill it in some more. Nobody looks
in there but me anyway. No water.
Copyright 2006 by the Tipton Poetry Journal.
All rights remain the exclusive property of the individual poet and may not be used without their permission.