The vet said, “Amen,” when
I said it should be so for us,
describing the lab’s last day.
When each of our labs
ended their days
they were given sedatives
and a very peaceful way
out of this troubling life
and all of its strife.
We can only hope
that some day
we will be treated
as well as our dogs
and their grace-filled,
compassionate
end of life way.

An apricot? Why not?
He just read that the
fruit of doom was
not an apple but
actually an apricot.
Really? But then why not?
An apricot may be
as seductive as an
apple, at least his favorite,
an Apricot apple.
An apricot? Why not?

Our watchdog, watching out
For us every step – perfectly
Quiet paws moving our way,
Always watching when he
Thought we might stray.
He was quiet, very quiet
For a big dog, a ninety-pound
Chocolate lab. He didn’t make
A sound but his presence was
Profound. His body was
Growing with toxins, poisons,
Sepsis and cancer, but he
Never let on. He just came
Silently alongside us to guide
Us along. He died today. He
Just gave up the ghost and
Now in the silence all around
We imagine his paws pawing
The ground silently looking
For us, finding us and loving us
In ways eternally profound.

We are back from camping
and kayaking. We kayaked
on a large lake yesterday
with choppy waters, big
winds and fast boats (fun
and a challenge if occasion-
ally a bit scary) and today
we were on a little, quiet
pond with all the turtles
on the dead tree trunks
and branches and two red-
headed, sand hill cranes
hovering protectively over
a nest on a small island
on the pond — so peaceful
and meditative…choppy
waters and big boats, a
little, quiet pond, turtles
galore diving in as we pass-
ed quietly by paddles cutt-
ing through the water, dipp-
ing by the lily pads, barely
slapping the surface and
cranes straining at our
passing, near silent boats,
watching, waiting, protect-
ing.

The commentator asked why the
rhetoric has jacked up so quickly
between the president and the

leader of North Korea jacking
up the stress and anxiety of the
American people. We didn’t

know to be so jacked up because
we were camping and didn’t hear
anything about it for the time it

has been going on, but, hey, two
psychos playing “Mine is Bigger
Than Yours” grade school recess

drivel is not real big on our must
watch TV even now that we are
home and watching TV, however,

the very mention of the president’s
name is enough to jack up our anxiet-
ies like when I was a kid watching

the original, really scary Mummy
movie especially for an eight-year-
old on a dark, summer night in the

neighbor’s side yard and I screamed
bloody murder as a fire-fly flew
by my eye.

The powers that be aren’t racist,
they actually are quite inclusive,
and they won’t lie; their budget
proposals cry that they just want
all the poor to rise up and die.
Poor whites have the least hope
in their hearts, less hope than
poor Hispanics and less than
poor blacks. While the rich plan
on Machu Picchu, poor whites
particularly poor, rural whites
think a pinch or two of heroin
or a pill or two of Norco will
do, all the while federal assist-
ance programs are shrinking and
proposed cuts are rising and
the powers that be could care
less if the poor are white, black,
yellow or brown, they just want
all the poor to drown in their
pain and hopelessness and pills
and booze and suicide and vanish
from the earth so the rich can
have the whole, stinking, putrid
pie.

We take the dog for walks
along Main Street on Saturdays.
Shoppers stop and ask if they
may pet our chocolate lab. “Oh,
of course. We actually aren’t
dog lovers. We got him so people
would stop and talk to us. We
don’t have any friends.” They
look at us with cocked heads and
a quizzical look on their faces
and then say, “Oh, you are such a
kidder.” We then move on to the
next person who wants to pet the
dog and I wait to be called “The
Kidder.” Apparently, the dog
loves the attention.

I thought about the clouds that gathered —
coming together everywhere,
and then I thought about the sun’s despair
at not showing forth here, there.

The rains came like sheets so silken rare
brought over mountainous air
into valleys and plying Polo’s wares,
costing more than gold’s cold stares.

It fell upon the dry and hardened ground
sinking in and then
causing havoc in its wake running around
the streets and in washes up and down.

The clouds dispersed and left the wind
to gather floods drawing
them into places without such dangerous fun
while all celebrated the return of the sun.

Fifty percent of American Christians
believe that the poor are poor because
they are lazy
and it must make Jesus crazy,
because their Lord was born poor,
lived with the poor
and urged his followers to care for the poor
who were the victims of the powers that be,
so, how can this be?
Compassionless, selective readers of the Proverbs
they must be,
deniers of the prophets and
deaf to the beatitudes
and parables they surely be.
It’s just crazy.
It’s called apostasy
and those purveyors of heretical
“individual salvation in Jesus Christ”
believers don’t even know
what that may be
or even that they be guilty.
American Christianity is just crazy.

He dropped his spare, rearview mirror
Which attaches to his glasses so he can
See behind him as he is riding his bike.
He heard a voice call to him as he walked
His bike down the sidewalk, “Hey, you
Just dropped this,” said the Latino.
“Oh, thanks. It must have dropped out
Of my bike bag. Thank you.” As the
Latino walked away, he said, “Have a
Nice day.” The cyclist thought about
The Good Samaritan in a small way.