I just came inside. I put a candle on her grave. I looked up at the night sky and there are so many little stars visible. I am hoping she is with Elliot again…
Each night she helped me put big bird to bed and lingered by her cage until she heard Sunny say, “bye bye.” One more trip outside so she could escort her shy brother Max in the dark. Each morning she helped make the bed by pulling on a corner of the comforter and then into big birds room again to bring her out.
She loved her yard and the fresh cedar chips I layered on monthly. I sat on the patio this afternoon as the wind blew and thought of her standing at the top of the hill, that beautiful Airedale profile with her little donkey ears pushed back. How funny she would run down the hill, her stiff back legs working to drive her momentum towards me.
Of all the dogs I have had I know, Gracie loved me the most. People would watch us together and so many folks said how lovingly she looked at me. Her gaze pulled me into her generous spirit and I tried to forget her past and be in this time with her when love was ever present.
I feel like I am about to fall down so I tell myself she was suffering and could hardly breath, that what I did for her was merciful. I believe an era has ended. The Native Americans believe that each living creature adds a vibratory level of harmony to nature’s song and with each one we lose the harmony is disrupted. Maybe that is why I feel so unbalanced.
Hiding behind this email is my screen saver that is the wonderful picture you took of her and Max last summer. Thank you. Her beautiful little face…
I love Emily Dickinson and this poem seems so suitable right now:
On such a night, or such a night,
Would anybody care
If such a little figure
Slipped quiet from its chair —
So quiet — Oh how quiet,
That nobody might know
But that the little figure
Rocked softer — to and fro —
On such a dawn, or such a dawn —
Would anybody sigh
That such a little figure
Too sound asleep did lie
For Chanticleer to wake it —
Or stirring house below —
Or giddy bird in orchard —
Or early task to do?
There was a little figure plump
For every little knoll —
Busy needles, and spools of thread —
And trudging feet from school —
Playmates, and holidays, and nuts —
And visions vast and small —
Strange that the feet so precious charged
Should reach so small a goal!
-Emily Dickinson