Loose

So, the dogs have gotten loose
and skid across the yard in panicky freedom.
They think that everything good is outside and maybe it is,
but dogs are students of doorways,
an opening is a moment is a chance. They’re out.

The short-haired terrier mouths I’m sorry
from top of a rain barrel, the last known address
of those chipmunks who live to enrage.
And pushing thru a gap in the boxwood hedge
my schnauzer triples her chances of vehicular suicide.

I let barrel-top girl enjoy her tottery freedom,
now in her Mount Olympus regret
and too high above her jump-down range,
and stretch myself into a hunt for that mutt
whose name means: wrong move
while her name for me is clearly, she-who-fights-me.

My only chance to capture is to
catapult dog biscuits over her head
to smash enticingly on the sidewalk.
Her subatomic sniffing will overcome
rapid leg movement
just long enough to grab belly and hold.

Remember the myth of Atlanta?
The footrace to catch the unwed beauty?
Remember golden apples dropped at her feet?
No? Well, read up. Become the myth, become the lover
pursue that fast, chubby dog…
her desire to chew will overcome her frolicking escape.

But who can blame her?
Indoor chase is only the circling of tables and chairs,
squeaky toy in mouth, tail-tucked, then fatigue
and napping on her floor pillow.
Escape is a desire on par with rawhide chews
as all those leash-led ambulators know.

Meanwhile, canine bravos
from neighborhood dog-captives jeer my efforts
and I am a despot nabbing their heroine.
But those housebound mutts will have to rally
another yard break another day:
these doggies are exiled back to the house.