Good Dog

Sometimes my dog takes me for walks.  I follow her insatiable nose where it leads and clean up the fun stuff she leaves behind.  We go on these walks because she dances and snorts whenever I get close to my sneakers and generally looks so stifled and sad that I cannot leave her inside any longer.  

Then some nights, I take her for walks.  Nights where she is already curled up tighter than cinnamon bun (and about the same color), with snout indiscernible from tail.   No matter how sleepily she may look at me, though, she obliges my desire to stroll through the dark neighborhood.  Good dog.  

Last night happened to be such a night. The moon called, you see.  When it is clear enough in Seattle to see the moon, one must not waste time.  Leash on, shoes on, puffy jacket on, and soon, the attendant peace of boots going crunch crunch over frosted grass, and the dear dog nose going whiff whiff through every bush.  

The rhythm of walking tends to take the edge off of unruly thoughts, giving a cadence to their disorder.  Step.  Step.  Step.  stop and sniff.  Step. Step. Step.  Moon above, cold air, keep moving.  I didn't expect midnight revelations, only the mild refreshment of the winter evening, so I was surprised at 195th and 3rd to sense things had gotten real quiet inside me.  

I am so tired, I said.  

I know, You said.  

I hated Greek, I said, wincing.  

But something else whispered alongside the wince. 

I could go, I said, though I'm not sure why.  

All the while we walked, little dog on the left leading the way through the dark.  Stopped to shit.  Kept going.  

Well then, I said to the still night and to my still self, Princeton in the fall is beautiful.  

Back at home while the steam from a cup of steeping tea drifted into my face, and the little red dog had tucked her head into her side, I opened my hands and released  greek verbs and exegetical papers and research conferences to the Spirit's keeping.  It will be the work of the Spirit, after all, if I make it back to school again, so I will go on walks during the in-between time.  Step. Step. Step.  

And though the last lights off the black West went

     Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs--

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

    world broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.  

Gerard Manley Hopkins