Dog
       

We truncate what you need to be
to fit you in your lucky life
with us. We cut and paste, to see
the version that brings us delight.

The almost-language in your eye,
that seems such sorrow to my own,
is just a suffocated cry
that leaves you, finally, alone,

and willing to accept much less:
a place beside the hearth, had we
still hearths; mock food; a pedigree
that shapes, yet won't admit, redress.

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Copyright © 2012 James Cummins All rights reserved
from Still Some Cake
Carnegie Mellon University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission