A Life Measured in Dogs

Just before one a.m. the dog and I go alone into the old potato field. It turns out we aren't our bodies, but our bodies aren't unhelpful either. Or so I think, being prone as always to translation. Historically, when asked to explain anything spiritual, I retreat into sex. I said once to Chrisoula "take it or leave it" to which she said "or love it, you idiot" and pulled me into her arms where I am still finding myself, gratefully. This is where you turn towards the forest, this is where you hunker and run your fingers through the frost. It's cold but not too cold: my pheasant-hunting hat scratches a little pulled down. I leave my ears exposed, hoping to hear owls or maybe a deer bounding away. Mostly though there's wind and the sound wind makes when it passes through the tops of pine trees. Is it okay to love solitude? When life is simply what unfolds without effort in awareness anyway? Clouds make a ladder to the blurred moon, the way stories from childhood saw us through the years to here. From a distance, what is many appears to be and move as one, and yet. My feet make a whispery sound falling one after the other; the feeder pond is just visible ahead, a pale oval I wouldn't want to fall into. But how far will we go? How far must we go? There is so much I don't know and can't be bothered learning anymore. A life measured in dogs who love us in ways we can only imagine? Say I do. Back home I read and write until dawn, stepping out one last time to listen for the only song that matters. How clear life is when every morning one marries again the chickadees always saying yes.