Like those halcyon barks of yore.

You blessed this diminished planet

With your loveliness sixteen years,

Plus a few months – a long time

In doggie years, not near enough for us.

Tears were shed, but not the overflow

Of previous losses, since you gave us

Many years of uninterrupted joy,

Coming to share your zest for living.

Wait for us, pray for us, send your

Vibrations our way so we won’t stray.

Another life awaits us – the lucky,

Chosen few, called to Doggie Heaven.

Note:  We returned from a tour of northern Spain and dear Rosie had waited for us just long enough for last goodbyes.  The most beautiful dog ever, drivers would pull up next to Irene as she walked Rosie, express their admiration of her beauty.  Beautiful in all ways, we missed her terribly but knew it was time.  A week later, we drove down to Colorado Springs to visit another rescue Australian terrier – lovely Princess – and brought her home with us.  Six years old and full of love, she looks amazingly like Rosie, with just enough difference to make a difference.  Moral to the story:  there is none.  We just figured, we needed another dog to fulfill our lives.  And remember:  you have a dog (or dogs, in our case, with nine-year-old Marco, too), then there’s reason for living….and you’ll live longer.

for you demand undivided attention.

It’s spring and things fly up

from new moist grass,

flitting erratically, causing you

to leap, bound, squirt in different

directions, ignoring the leash,

pulling like a sixty-pound sled dog

instead of the standard dozen-pounder.

A lady runner this morning

suddenly stopped to caress you,

laughing when I told her you were

half longhaired dachshund,

most likely half black alligator.

You’re four and a half and

should have outgrown your childish

ways by now, but no matter.

I’m going on seventy and

together we’re the childish, mis-

chievous, unpredictable gang of two.

(Published in the Vol. 22, No. One issue of Bellowing Ark, January/February 2006)

Note:  We never thought Marco (the Barko) would grow up.  He’s eight now, still pulls erratically at the leash, and obviously hasn’t grown up.  He’ll always be a child, for whatever reason.  We’ve tried everything, so please, no advice.  He’s our first boy dog….and he’s my boy.  It’s hard for us to separate.  I’m not sure which of us is the bigger child.

Tobacco was the crop.

As I recall, hazily,

They also had

Farm animals,

All much larger

Than I’d imagined.

A horse kicked

My brother in the head.

He was never

Right again.

Or did the horse

Kick me instead?

I can’t be sure.

It’s the reason

I never liked vegetables.

They grow on farms.

It’s also the reason

I don’t ride horses.

They grow on farms, too.

Note:  Goes to show what I know about farms and its inhabitants.  Fortunately, over the years, some of my work colleagues and close friends grew up on farms and were kind enough to suffer my questions.  Their answers provided a liberal education such that I’m glad I didn’t grow up on a farm as they did – too damned much work involved.  When asked if they’d ever consider going back, say, after retirement, not a single taker.  That was then, this is now.  The poem, though broadly drawn, is essentially a true retelling.

with my beaver-skin cap,

I admire myself in the mirror,

resplendent in real-chamois shirt,

tanned leather pants, snakeskin belt,

and slick lizard boots.

Ah, of course, my necklace of

gleaming yellow bear teeth.

Yes, I’m ready to slip into my

precious coat of non-faux fox fur

and stride off proudly to meet

with friends of similar mind:

we’ve set ourselves a course,

perhaps impossible:  Save the Whales.

(Published in the Winter 2005 issue of P.D.Q., Poetry Depth Quarterly)

Note:  Written entirely with tongue in cheek.  However, how many times have I seen doers of good setting off to save the world or whatever, outfitted with all the tell-tale trophies of animals or whatever, similar to the objects they’re bent on saving.  ‘Tis a sobering sight to watch their plight.  Poetry Depth Quarterly, alas, has become extinct, so indeed….save the whales!  Save the magazines and newspapers!  Save the printed word!

It was wonderful seeing our country again

in all its glory, magnificent in sun and rain.

We saw bison we could almost reach out

and pet from our rental car, elk and pronghorn

antelope with their newborn, still wobbly.

Moose are as ugly as I remember and as beautiful

as I care to imagine – real, live, three-dimensional.

Bear tried to come into camp too, to steal food.

It was cowboy cookout night, steak and beans and

coffee cooked over wood fires, the bears tempted

no doubt by the meat smells, possibly the caffeine.

There were no newspapers, radio or television

up there in the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone, still

so pristine it makes you weep for their future.

A new-found friend on the wagon ride back to our

cars told me Tim Russert had died, nearly knocking

me over, so young a man he seemed, so much family.

I wept a little, unabashedly, tried to see where we

in America are headed, then reflected on this great

landscape that still defines who we are, our grandeur.

Where will we go in the weeks and years ahead, trying

so hard to hold on to what we’ve been, uncertain about

what we might become, this awesome land of ours?

I have a feeling Tim Russert knew what the outcome

will be, and is ready to pose the difficult question:

Are we ready, do we have the gumption of our forebears?

(Published in the Fall 2008 issue of Bellowing Ark)

Note:  Irene and I visited Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Park in early June, 2008.  With us were two sets of old friends from France, Philippe et Francois Berge, plus Philippe et Francine LeBoucher, as well as brother Jim Roberts and his wife Laurie.  It was snowing pretty hard when we landed late at night, but all went well thereafter.  America, especially in the wild as we saw it, is magnificently beautiful, way too difficult for me to describe adequately.  The news of Tim’s death pierced my heart, since I’d long been a dedicated fan.  Tim, like my dear friend Diane Rehm of NPR radio, would ask the difficult question of pols and pundits, never aiming low, always after the truth, fairly requested.  Folks like Tim and Diane are among our national treasures – America! – just like Yellowstone and the Tetons.  Let’s preserve them – certainly their memory.

but not me.

Polite Tony Dungy, the NFL Commissioner,

the Eagles’ coach, a bunch of salivating Eagles’ fans,

but not me.

Even heard a nice looking reporter on “Good Morning

America” say he believed in

redemption and forgiveness, a second chance,

but not me.

How many of my sisters and brothers

did Michael Vick kill, horribly?

How many second chances did he think to give them?

Fella named Adolf Hitler passed this way once,

killed some six million dogs of humanity -

Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, others

he didn’t throw a bone to,

give a second chance.

Hitler hasn’t been redeemed or forgiven yet,

but truth is,

he didn’t play ball for the NFL.

(Note:  I doubt this poem is publishable, maybe because few if any would have the courage to publish it, but I felt I had to get it out of my system.  Is the NFL so hard up, I wonder, that it has to stoop to the Michael Vicks of this world to keep its cash register overflowing?  Vick is a good football player.  He’s not a good human being.  Woof! and for shame, NFL.)