Retriever

My work? I snatch sticks from the air — because
he always needs them, quick, over and over —
and trot them back. His almost hairless paws
patting our patch of thinning grass and clover,

he tugs things from my jaws and flings them out
again for me to find. Sometimes he needs,
instead, a ball, a stone, sent with a shout
over some puddled snow or matted weeds;

I catch those too. It's pleasant work, but long,
and must be done sometimes when I could wish
for stillness, when those other smells are strong
that are not his, not from his coat, the dish

he fills for me, but from that other place
that comes to me when light goes, and then goes
when light brings back his fingers and his face
to rub those other smells away and close

that other door I almost go through. Why
do I serve him? Who else would recover
treasures he's always losing? Only I
forecast his pitch so well I see things hover

in air before he throws them, stone or stick,
word or caress. Those others seldom stay
after the light comes back, and they don't lick
his face, although he strokes their fear away

and nuzzles them for hours. I'm needed here.
And compensated too, considering
the dish, the bowl of water, days when we're
busy together at some crucial thing

that only he and I know how to do:
loud sparks to bristle at when brush is burning,
long silences to hear and ponder through,
so much that needs his tossing, my returning.

 

© Rhina P. Espaillat

From Rehearsing Absence (University of Evansville Press, 2001), winner of the 2001 Richard Wilbur Award.