A short telephone message
came from the vet’s office:
“The ashes are ready.”
Two weeks before, “Wally” snapped
at my hand, frightened,
his hind legs paralyzed.
It was the end of a long illness.
I cradled him in a towel.
They were kind to us.
I told them he was a good dog;
that he was now in doggy heaven.
Their sympathy card is still on the refrigerator.

A wild boar colored mini-Daschund,
his ******* called him “Stormin’ Norman”
because he was the litter runt;
but we named him after
the wallaby he resembled,
and because he was a “soft” dog.

His sister, Wheedl, the alpha dog,
would try to steal his food.
She was the only one he ever growled at.
He never tilted his head, perplexed at humans,
like dogs who don’t understand us.
If we were leaving the house,  
he just looked away, resigned.
When a dropped biscuit flew under the refrigerator,
he knew where it would come out
if we hit it with a wooden spoon.
He would stand on that spot,
while his sister, a more typical dog,  
would stand where it went in.

Wheedl is now lost.
She can’t hear, and stays very close.

We have returned our gift to mother earth.