Good Dog
By Dianne Pearce
You stood in front of your owner’s truck, prancing in your gait
not from happiness
but from trying to walk sideways
in front of the oversized blue truck of your master
to block it from driving off
I’d pulled over to see if I could help your owner catch you
Your owner screamed at you and me
You were a stray
Not his dog! Not his dog!
You were so confused
upset to be not in the truck
to be put out in a road you didn’t know
You were trying to evolve human speech right in front of me
to explain to him who owned you that he’d made a mistake here
But he pumped the gas,
lurching the truck
trying to scare you from in front of it
You would not go
You tried to climb the front grill
The huge tire had your paws on it next
even though this could have put you under it
crushed you to dust
It was a standoff
his hate fierce, baring its teeth against your need
to be back in the cab
with him who you loved
he who hated you
Finally your anxious gait bounced you
accidentally
to the side
Your terrible owner
saw his opportunity
slammed the gas pedal
swung the wheel hard into the oncoming lane
swerved back and forth
sped away
away
from you
You turned
You ran
So fast
So fast
Your feet met
in the middle
back and front
under you
for each stride
You were faster than any living thing had ever been or will ever be
But the truck was not a living thing, and the man driving it had lost his humanity
So when it hit the bend in the road
topped 70 in the oncoming lane
willing to kill any other car that might have happened to drive on that side
Willing
to kill
to crash
just to get away from you
When that happened
when you realized you couldn’t catch him
when the bastard who had owned you finally succeeded in throwing you away
I heard your stalwart heart break
as you howled
hooked a left
across the road through the cornfield and cemetery
and disappeared into the woods
at top speed
to a place where no one could ever find you
so that you could just die already
Alone
Thrown away
Following his orders
(as always, for you were a good dog)
to make yourself trash.