Our neighbors, being our neighbors
put him in a cardboard box
by the barn so on coming
home I would not, running
to his corpse, collapse and cry there
by the road. What care
did you have, my little Summer
King? You were not of the dumber
pets I owned. You were mine.
You came to me and being kind
I took you, fed you, loved you, dear.
Baby, I could not fear
for your safety long or keep you.
It is new,
this mourning feeling of loss and pain.
For nothing so tragic has ever occurred
and I cried for days and days, I promised you
my little baby boy that I’d cry for you everyday
and visit your grave up in the yard
that mound of dirt so unfit for a King.
Yes, you deserve a tomb
made of marble and gold
a glass coffer for you to decompose
would be suitable for such a lord.
But instead your bloated body lies on bare dirt
and as the days go by I find my eyes drying.