( This poem is based on a man my father bought a colt off of. This old man also raised cattle and had the dogs. These stories I like best. Poems made up of lives )
Why do you keep him?
That old dog
Burrs in his tail
Hitch in his trot
He is not a powerful dog
Why do you keep him?
I keep him because
When I speak
He looks into my eyes
And listens
I look back
and
He is always there
When I get into my truck
he jumps in beside me
When I saddle a horse he waits
watching
When the stock is rough,
and days are long
Hot
Wet
Freezing
He tries
I've seen my child's hand slide down his back,
and my wife gave him gravy at Christmas
I shattered my hip when a colt, newly started, dumped my old bones into a fence
I was laid up for months
he lay near me
And sometimes
I counted the hours by his slow wagging tail.
Why do you keep him?
That old dog
Burrs in his tail
Hitch in his trot
He is not a powerful dog
Why do you keep him?
I keep him because
When I speak
He looks into my eyes
And listens
I look back
and
He is always there
When I get into my truck
he jumps in beside me
When I saddle a horse he waits
watching
When the stock is rough,
and days are long
Hot
Wet
Freezing
He tries
I've seen my child's hand slide down his back,
and my wife gave him gravy at Christmas
I shattered my hip when a colt, newly started, dumped my old bones into a fence
I was laid up for months
he lay near me
And sometimes
I counted the hours by his slow wagging tail.
