Steve reminded me that Kiki is an old dog. It isn’t really news – she was 5 when I got her in 2017, and 9 years have passed. She is deafer than I, walks with a limp or two, and quality time has gotten to be sleeping in the same room where I am. There is still the joy of road trips – whether to the post office or hauling garbage, it’s a worthwhile trip to her.
She was supposed to be Renata’s dog – a fluffy Pomeranian arriving for Mother’s Day. Dogs can be difficult gifts – Kiki and Renata have been in competition for the Alpha female role since she arrived. Like most friends, you don’t make the choice, the dog does. So I’ve spent 9 years with a little fluffy Pomeranian who has made the decision that the two of us belong together. I could leave Shadow, her predecessor, dozing in the pickup, listening to Rush Limbaugh, while I worked outside. Kiki dozes on the seat, awakening to look through the window, into the old service station where I am remodeling. I know that the gift of a dog’s companionship brings with it the grief of a short life-span.
When Kiki refused to get along with Renata, we got a second Pomeranian – the Little Lass. She’s middle-aged now, and needs meds for congestive heart failure. I fold her pills into a piece of cheese, then each little girl gets cheese twice a day.
Kipling wrote The Power of a Dog:
There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
And when we are certain of sorrow in store,
Why do we always arrange for more?
Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.
Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie—
Perfect passion and worship fed
By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head.
Nevertheless it is hardly fair
To risk your heart for a dog to tear.
When the fourteen years which Nature permits
Are closing in asthma, or tumour, or fits,
And the vet’s unspoken prescription runs
To lethal chambers or loaded guns,
Then you will find—it’s your own affair—
But… you’ve given your heart to a dog to tear.
When the body that lived at your single will,
With its whimper of welcome, is stilled (how still!).
When the spirit that answered your every mood
Is gone—wherever it goes—for good,
You will discover how much you care,
And will give your heart to a dog to tear.
We’ve sorrow enough in the natural way,
When it comes to burying Christian clay.
Our loves are not given, but only lent,
At compound interest of cent per cent.
Though it is not always the case, I believe,
That the longer we’ve kept ’em, the more do we grieve:
For, when debts are payable, right or wrong,
A short-time loan is as bad as a long—
So why in—Heaven (before we are there)
Should we give our hearts to a dog to tear?
This poem is in the public domain.
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