Dogs

I am off for my walk along the shore,

a cold and windy day like the one Elizabeth Bishop wrote about

in “The End of March,” the sky the same mutton-fat jade,

even if I don’t know what mutton-fat looks like.

I remember she was following dog-prints big as lion-prints.

The biggest dog here is Josie, more like a barge

than a lion. She limps arthritically up the street,

eternally optimistic. Amanda and Dewey disband their symposium

so everyone can kiss each other in secret places.

Then the Lab with the red bandana comes up.

Then I come to the three full-sized poodles, teeth bared.

The white one has gotten out of her fence and starts

after me, red bows bobbing over her ears.

I don’t know why I can’t just walk down the road thinking

about how Elizabeth Bishop turns her sun into a stalking lion.

Probably it was a shadow. I feel a little responsible

for the animals, I pet them when they let me.

I do it in memory of my poor brother, and Mrs. Laverty,

who taught him the 300 words before he died, and I do it

in memory of the yelling and sobbing. I could just as well do it

for Elizabeth Bishop, opening her eyes, trying to remember

what to be ashamed of, how many words

betrayed by drink. I try to remember her poem, the animals

shadowing me, stammering and practicing,

Their faces are like boarded-up summer houses, canny

but withdrawn. When I look at them directly, whichever dogs

have come along dubiously nose the ground. And sometimes

I wonder if they should trust me at all, the way I get lost

in Bishop and her lion and mutton-fat jade

while the world around me is

slurping and sniffing with recognition and pleasure.