So much of our happiness is tied in knots that reside outside of us

In other hearts

It is difficult to quantify how much love is held in another chest

until death

Unconsciously

My ears stretch to hear what is not present anymore

My eyes search without reward

I want to feel the warmth of your body lying beside me

Your sin was your shadow self

I have my own

I knew you were a hunting dog

And yet so much more

You were soft, beneath your chin

And you had no idea of your size and strength when you wanted to snuggle in on my lap

You loved me so much

and that

That above all feels like a betrayal of you, of self

I couldn’t bargain for an extension

What you did was so brutal, yet as natural as taking a breath

bumping my hand for attention

You did no wrong

I’m sorry my friend

You were just doing a dog

And I had to be civilized

and do the human thing

Buried by a tree

is all of my joy

it seems

today, none lives in me

or if it does

I cannot find it

We cannot measure the weight

until its gone

and it is frightening my friend, frightening

how much of me

lived in your broad white chest

Grief is a coin tossed into a bottomless well

I don’t await the sound of it ceasing

from experience I know it never decreases

it just keeps spinning and turning, out of sight

in the dark

Occasionally, I check my pocket

and find

There is an endless supply, so I keep tossing

Trying to relieve the weight

and the sound of hollow clinking

in my chest

It will not rest

but eventually it will fall to a depth

where I can breathe again

*Dogs, no more dogs. They steal so much more joy when they die than they bring in life. The equation makes no emotional sense. If I’m honest, it never has, I just didn’t get it before. Last night I went through them all in my head, my dogs who have been companions, their names bracketed in years that we lived together, what each taught me and what those years grew in terms of personal maturity. So much, but even the gift of those lessons is not enough.

Yesterday I lost my one with a massive chest, part Dane, part Mastiff. He would lean his head into my shoulder and collapse with a sigh beside me, on me. He had no idea of his size. He loved me so much, his eyes would follow everything I did. Ridiculous. I have no idea what I did to deserve that care, it seemed such a colossal imbalanced return for morning walks, a soft bed, tummy scratches and snacks. But all that collateral in my emotional bank, all that staggering amount of love, was withdrawn in one big hit. He was a hunting dog, and after years of lounging on my kitchen mat, I had forgotten it.

Autumn weather and a couple of easy targets in the poddy calves over the back fence reminded me brutally.

I have made reparations to the owners. Paid our dues emotionally, internally and outside financially for their loss. Done the responsible thing. The guilt and the shame of what my animal did to their animals, live alongside the love and the loss I feel at having to do that. I don’t feel entitled to be sad. But I am. Deeply so. The body is like that – instinctual, honest – like a dog.

Ultimately, my dog was my responsibility; the wrong was mine. But we don’t shoot ourselves; we reimburse people financially and shoot the offender so it doesn’t happen again. What a shitty system – not worth the emotional cost, the risk. I’m certainly not doing it again.

No more dogs.

But I still have one.

This last small brown dog. Nine years old, she sleeps at my feet. She rolls her eyes and grins when she laughs. She possesses more character and humour than most humans and greets me with stupid amounts of happiness, even if I have only been out of sight for a moment. When she goes, I will suffer dreadfully, then no more—leastways, not about dogs. Other than this residue of regrets.

We have losses in life. It is, as I said, genuinely frightening how much of ourselves we give away to other people, but dogs – dogs we can’t help it, there is no barrier, no fence – it just escapes into their beautiful chests. And we don’t know how much is tied up in them until they are gone and that loss is turned into an ache. All that love, is just coins in the air that we toss.

Stupidly.

Bodhi, my little one, is still teaching me. This morning, despite losing her best mate in traumatic circumstances which she witnessed as well. Requiring me to march through paddocks to retrieve her yesterday. Followed me with great love and trust, out the gate this morning, down the road, sniffing at the morning smells. Lost in the moment.

Does she carry any sad weight or burden? Well, it doesn’t seem to be so. She is walking on a new day—a new moment. She moves on lightly, leaving the past in the past where it belongs. I will have to get her to teach me how to do this before she goes. That would be a lesson worth the risk of loving so deeply. If only I could learn that trick. That would be worth her loss if she could teach me that; it would be the penultimate lesson of dog wisdom. They’ve taught me nearly everything else. How to love, certainly – how to let go of love – not so much.

The blog continues, and I wanted to write a post to say sorry to my friend for his horrid end but also a thank you for his love. To place a marker here in the ether. I can’t tell the lady who texts me about how devastated her kids are at the loss of their poddy calves that he was a good dog, and I will forever miss him. Instead, I have to promise that at least it won’t happen again, that the offender is dead. And I will pay for the vet. My front stairs are empty of his weight, and I can’t step around the facts. But I can put it here, which will close the chapter for me. Because, like Bodhi, I’m hoping to learn how she leaves it in the past and go walking on another day, like it is brand new and fresh.

I can’t do it yet. But I’ll get there.

Header photo: AI art generated from a heartfelt prompt and it makes sense – to me it makes sense anyway. Apart from the monkey, I have never had a monkey, but I’ve had some mischievous dogs. Maybe that is it.