Brown Dog Series
4/2/20
From The Immediate and No Sooner, published in 2021.
I saw a man walking a brown dog in front of our house. For some reason the image really stuck with me, and I don’t know why, because I don’t much like dogs and anyway, you see dogs and people walking dogs all the time, don’t you? Nevertheless, when I feel this way, I follow the urge.
I did several poems in different forms. I think now I have expressed all that I felt and saw that day. Here they are.
Tanka 164
brown dog lithe long legs
smooth glide and a weave reweave
switch stride doing undoing
propelling. April is cold:
He wears a red coat.
Shadorma 278
that brown dog
in a red coat. Legs
sew switchback
cross-stitches
Waxed threads drawn by a needle
through a cold morning
Haiku 818
Brown dog in red coat.
Not-quite-spring April sunrise.
Hurry our walk. Cold.
Brown Dog
Look out the door one
minute past sunrise
wow he sure can go
I think. The rattles
from the inside of
my battered and frayed
old morning head I’m
not up to talk yet
but I could take in
that sidewalk scene of
brown dog wide awake
on the move and fast
one leashed human man
in tow. That brown dog
brown like hot coffee
plus cream and does he
ever have a shine
a vitality
from more than the light
seeped from that tired
stayed-up-too-late and
all-tapped-out today
pale sun queasy weak
and bleary dragging
up and out of bed
just the same as the
rest of us who groan
and moan because it’s
just too darn early
for what might for what
is coming at us
but we still have to
shine. I feel it too
Oh I feel it. And
Here goes another
day Let’s hope and then
I quit thinking what
I hope but instead
I make to shuffle
back into the house
having found out what
I opened the door
to which was April
the version which is
chilly but what a
shine it has on it
and the brown dog he
scissors those legs on
goes a nice long trot
a smooth easy glide
that brown dog he is
alive and whole and
his brown coat does shine
he goes and he goes
alive and in fine shine
each line 5 syllables
Claudia McGill Writes Poetry, Did You Know That? 
The dogs around here also seem more ready than their owners for those early morning strolls. (K)
Funny you say that, I was out this morning and ran into a neighbor and his tiny dog who outwalks the neighbor twice a day (says the owner). They were quite some distance from home and a long trek on those tiny legs and it was the human who was lagging!
You capture the scene and especially the movement of the dog perfectly.
I don’t like dogs at all but I enjoy watching them with their owners and how they interact with each other (or don’t).
I’m glad that it was a dog that made such an impression and deserved so many poems.
You know, I don’t like dogs at all, I’m very afraid of them, due to some bad experiences from childhood, but the picture this dog and person made to me was one of those things that would not leave me, until I could express the impression it made on me. Which was as the poems said. I don’t know why this subject but I guess it proves that some things come from a deeper place than just my own known feelings? Anyway, Thank you.