After you've Gone

A few weeks after we put down our dog Zorba, my best friend Mira came for a visit . “Come for a while, stay as long as it feels good to us all” we said to her as way of invitation. We were all still suffering losses. Ours was Zorba, hers was her brother’s death in ia terriible motorcycle acciident. We needed to be together. We have the kind of friendship that makes a place for grieving.

There was no plan for a new dog. . Milo showed up on an online post a couple of weeks after Mira arrived. “Look at this guy” Andy called to me from his computer. “Let’s go meet him” I said. I was ready. “Naw, it’s too soon. I can’t open my heart to a new dog yet.” he said. Still we all went to the shelter. We needed to be around dog energy.

You can guess what happened next. We met Milo. We all fell in love and he joined the pack we were becoming.

Three years later I am awaked in the still dark morning as the metal gate closes and the taxi taking Mira to the airport for her return flight to Ashland Oregon, pulls away, crunching loose rocks on our unpaved street.

The thin membrane that held us in the caccoon and made us a lfamily tears open as she leaves. The membrane is soft and tender like the top of a newborn’s head. It has a pulse, but it hasn’t closed as it will in the days to come.

Two people are a couple, three are a community. We are rediscovering our coupledom. I don’t know what I feel about these changes. I trust that they are what is right and next for us all. But what about Milo ? He was there from our beginning as a community of three. I wonder how he will feel in her absence.

And so I ask him. I am awake. The sound of the gate clanking closed woke me and I do what dog parents sometimes do with their feelings, i project them onto Milo. When I sent Milo’s poem to Mira in an email, I say, “Milo wrote you a poem”.

Here it is.

AFTER YOU’VE GONE

.I came out from my safe place

where I hide from the exploding cahotes.it

It was quiet. The fireworks stopped

and the dogs had fallen back to sleep.

and the roosters hadn't awakened.

.She was writing in her notebook by the light of a small lamp

so she would not wake Him.

I could hear the puff...puff..puff of His breathing machine.

I moved toward the door like I always do

waiting for Her to let me out to pee and come to you.

But she didn't stir from her writing.

I pawed the door.. She called me.

I looked at Her waiting

for the usual order of things to fall into place.

But something was different,

the order of things was not the same.

I plopped down beside her and watched the window.

.Maybe You will come and open the door

and give me breakfast like you do.

I am waiting for things to be the way they were.

And then I took a nap

.I haven't fully grasped you are gone.

And neither have they.