I’ll walk Gracie till she can no longer walk, be more vigilant when she stumbles near the edge of the pool I’ll watch her sleep as soundly as a pillow on a sofa, moved a couple times of day but otherwise resting and fixed in place what is there to do with an old dog when there are cracks on the thin ice of time? she moves along perfectly unconcerned while I alternate holding breathes

for twenty years, I stop to chat nearly every day as he sweeps his sidewalk laughter alternates with juicy bits of street news, the weather, his disappointing sunflowers a feral cat he feeds slinks across his driveway as he stoops to pet my dogs I like him, so why haven’t I invited him and his husband over for dinner or drinks? sometimes, the next step in a friendship is when the foot hovers, midair and without logic, and looking rather stupid, never drops to the gr

I pass a picture window my back bent, like a bow, waiting to be strung or perhaps a fishing rod with a big one pulling on the hook didn’t your mother ever yell Don’t hunch, stand up straight! her echo falls on my lazy ear, I groan and pull my spine skyward this entertainment comes with a caution: even this will not hasten my next kiss with the ground