—For Debby Sundstrom
Like you, I have searched for best places to hide
where the lost might meander
I’m once again young, who I am is a game
of come find me, surprise. I’ve sought to escape
what I once knew of bearings, honed
my own, pointed home, gone awry.
After natural disasters, the sheriffs would call
and you’d move house to house,
found a woman once, barely alive, by a tree
told your dog, a warm body, to drop
then gave her your coat. You never
took credit. Years later, you followed the logic of footprints
to locate young Blake, scared and scratched
but unhurt, nudged under a bush
by his Rottweiler, Sam, who’d stayed with him
and growled on approach, but you coaxed
to your side with beef jerky. Despite lows in the 30s,
he wasn’t cold, the boy said, then ate
the proffered oatmeal cookie.
The news reported Sam devoured a T-bone steak.
In hunting, you followed the Dao—spoke “dog,”
others said, trailing off at the loss of good words
to interpret abditives and fate.
I imagine wet kisses, reward
if I wait, if I’m patient, or go back in time
when I’m hidden in burrows, crevasses, my head,
greeted eigengrau dazed in dark space
seeking rescue, but mostly myself.
Now and then I confess I’ve been saved.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 26, Issue 4.
Sarah Carey is a graduate of the Florida State University creative writing program. Her work has appeared in numerous national literary journals over several decades. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks, including The Heart Contracts, winner of the 2018 Concrete Wolf Chapbook Award. She lives and works in Gainesville, Florida.
See all items about Sarah Carey
