the older dog died
nicolette reim
The younger one doesn’t know
where the dog is
she was with all her life.
My son says to me,
We think she’s sad.
I’m sad thinking of my mother,
and of the dog that can’t talk,
wandering everywhere
in the back yard of the house
we all once lived in together.
I’m not sure of anything—
grass grows in unexpected places,
the flowers are new.
I find an old tennis ball,
toss it.
The dog brings it back to me,
tail wagging.
I throw it again.
We play beneath the large
magnolia tree,
taller now.
Nicolette Reim is a poet, artist, and translator published in Glint Literary Journal, Pirene’s Fountain, Pittsburgh Poetry Review, wwwtheartsection, and recent anthologies Border Lines, Poems of Migration, and Rumors Secrets & Lies, Pregnancy, Abortion & Choice–– and other publications. She studied art at The New York Studio School and holds an MFA in poetry from Drew University. She exhibits abstractions of longhand and topography at NoHoM55 Gallery, NYC; lives/works in NYC and Atlanta, GA.