Cherita for Finbar

The op is over, he’s back, complete with lampshade to stop him pulling out the stitches. This is going to be a long ten days.

 

He tail-wags over,

 

dances around me, dog-dervish,

silent and intent,

 

operation over, stitched up,

jabbed full of antibiotics,

We go home now?

Haibun for a non-event

Well, the vet phoned to say he hadn’t been able to do Finbar and could we take him home please, bring him back next week sometime. Two emergencies came in, more deserving cases, traffic accidents  (one death under the knife). What can you say? Finbar isn’t priority, he just has a useless, annoying lump. In a way I’m pleased he isn’t priority. So we brought him home. He had his lunch, went for a walk to check it’s all where he left it, and now he’s sleeping. There’s a questioning though, a hesitation in his gestures, because something different happened and he doesn’t know why. Was he bad? Was it a punishment? He’s dog napping, but he’s thinking about the why of it all, and will it happen again.

Cold wind blows, ­le bise

cherry blossom ghosts flutter—

the dark year deepens.

 

Daily poem: Cherita 23

I have just left Finbar with the vet. He has to have a non-malignant lump removed. It started to bleed and won’t heal up if he keeps licking it. Best to get rid of it altogether.

He’s been left with a vet often enough to have wounds stitched up, so he probably knows the routine by now—jab, icky feeling, long sleep, icky feeling, sore stitches—even if this is a new vet.  I’m feeling rotten because, intelligent as we are, there are some things we just can’t explain to a dog.

 

I hand the lead to the vet,

 

dog turns and in his eyes,

the single question—why?

 

So much we cannot say,

explain—he follows, unwillingly, afraid.

Trust betrayed.