Open For Business

I love my dogs. All 3 of them. And even though they are forbidden to ever leave me, I know that sooner or later they will--I'm just hoping it's later. There's an area in the back of our property that I designated as the pet cemetery and I didn't expect to break ground in it for several more years. But last month, my sister called early one Saturday morning to tell me that her boyfriend's cat had died and they were about to pull in my driveway. I rolled out of bed, started the coffee maker, and went into the garage to search for a shovel. Studley was in a box along with the ashes of Billy's other cat, Nub. And they became the first occupants of the pet cemetery.

I've been bad about keeping up with Poetry Fridays but I wanted to share this poem by Sue Ellen Thompson. It's one of my favorites.

No Children, No Pets by Sue Ellen Thompson

I bring the cat’s body home from the vet’s
in a running-shoe box held shut
with elastic bands. Then I clean
the corners where she has eaten and
slept, scrubbing the hard bits of food
from the baseboard, dumping the litter
and blasting the pan with a hose. The plastic
dishes I hide in the basement, the pee-
soaked towel I put in the trash. I put
the catnip mouse in the box and I put
the box away, too, in a deep
dirt drawer in the earth...

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