"We who choose to surround ourselves
with lives even more temporary than our
own, live within a fragile circle;
easily and often breached.
Unable to accept its awful gaps,
we would still live no other way.
We cherish memory as the only
certain immortality, never fully
understanding the necessary plan."
Irving Townsend

 

These were my fur-kids, maybe the most joyful souls I've ever been blessed to know. They have gone on ahead of me for now but it will be such pleasure to see them again some day.
We loved each other so much and I treasured each day I had with them and miss them every day that we are apart.

 

 

 

Blossom sadly missed and never forgotten. 

Pebbles was with us only a short time and still she captured our hearts.

  Missed more than words can express.

 

The House Dog's Grave (Haig, an English bulldog)

      I've changed my ways a little; I cannot now
      Run with you in the evenings along the shore,
      Except in a kind of dream; and you, if you dream a moment,
      You see me there.

      So leave awhile the paw-marks on the front door
      Where I used to scratch to go out or in,
      And you'd soon open; leave on the kitchen floor
      The marks of my drinking-pan.

      I cannot lie by your fire as I used to do
      On the warm stone,
      Nor at the foot of your bed; no, all the night through
      I lie alone.

      But your kind thought has laid me less than six feet
      Outside your window where firelight so often plays,
      And where you sit to read--and I fear often grieving for me--
      Every night your lamplight lies on my place.

      You, man and woman, live so long, it is hard
      To think of you ever dying
      A little dog would get tired, living so long.
      I hope than when you are lying

      Under the ground like me your lives will appear
      As good and joyful as mine.
      No, dear, that's too much hope: you are not so well cared for
      As I have been.

      And never have known the passionate undivided
      Fidelities that I knew.
      Your minds are perhaps too active, too many-sided. . . .
      But to me you were true.

      You were never masters, but friends. I was your friend.
      I loved you well, and was loved. Deep love endures
      To the end and far past the end. If this is my end,
      I am not lonely. I am not afraid. I am still yours.


      Robinson Jeffers, 1941

       

       

             

            Losing Jake

      There's a hole in my heart where a dog used to be.
      He's nuzzled my soul and is now part of me.
      His pain is his life and I know what to do.
      But when I release him, I'm losing me, too.

      The puppy I cradled three short years ago
      is a ninety pound bundle of love and I know
      that he'd lick away all of my tears if he could.
      It's his sense of duty to make me feel good.

      It's my obligation to do what is best.
      The love of his "master" is put to the test.
      It's a wrenching and sorrowful way that we part;
      it doesn't hurt less when the head rules the heart.

      There's a hole in my heart where my Jake has passed through.
      When we say goodbye part of me will go too.

      Amy Waggoner

       


       



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