HILLS OF CINNABAR

In memory of “Sheba”

Mount Sentinel, I climb your hillside alone,
my Collie gone just a month and a day.
Along which trail does she scamper now?

A mountain’s presence is like a hand that smoothes the hair
of a shy child—softens forever the human heart.
Love commingles with my sadness:

death of an old dog like flesh cut out of my own body.
A body I once thought so intact,
I could withstand anything.

Muddy clouds wheel rambunctiously across the sky.
Mount Sentinel, who are you without the clouds?
Do you feel naked, incomplete without their comforting mist?

Twilight is tucking you in, gentle mountain.
I reverse my steps, hike down the same path
my Collie and I so often took—the easy trail, they call it.

My steps are shaky—like my Collie I am old and slow.
Before I leave the trail,
I place my hands on your dark hillside.

A solemn touch, Mount Sentinel,
for the black and white Collie who loved you,
for this aging woman who will never let you go.


Published in: Talking River, 2010, Issue 28