The Pet Years

Free verse

Two pets I have, and five are gone Though the poet once described how we measure days in coffee spoons (and I’ll add, our nights in bathroom trips as time unspools) we account for the arc of life by the loss of dogs and cats who spent their short lives

beside us. I miss their tolerance:

Alan, the all-too-human terrier; Airport, and her twin Jacuzzi black-striped and longest lived and Obi-Wan the runaway back after half a year before he stayed

to pace his final months within a taller fence.

Buffy (the vampire slayer) died too soon, buried at a property that belongs to strangers,

and as I watch the last two turning gray, hear them snore their days away and nest inside staid routines,

I shall peel back the years littered with

pet names and memories.