The House-Dog’s Grave

I’ve changed my ways a little: I cannot now

Run with you in the evenings along the shore,

Except in a kind of dream: and you, if you dream a moment,

You see me there.

So leave awhile the paw-marks on the front door

Where I used to scratch to go out or in,

And you’d soon open; leave on the kitchen floor

The marks of my drinking-pan.

I cannot lie by your fire as I used to do

On the warm stone,

Nor at the foot of your bed: no, all the nights through

I lie alone.

But your kind thought has laid me less than six feet

Outside your window where firelight so often plays,

And where you sit to read — and I fear often grieving for me —

Every night your lamplight lies on my place.

You, man and woman, live so long it is hard

To think of you ever dying.

A little dog would get tired living so long.

I hope than when you are lying

Under the ground like me your lives will appear

As good and joyful as mine.

No, dears, that’s too much hope: you are not so well cared for

As I have been,

And never have known the passionate undivided

Fidelities that I knew.

Your minds are perhaps too active, too many-sided. …

But to me you were true.

You were never masters, but friends. I was your friend.

I loved you well, and was loved. Deep love endures

To the end and far past the end. If this is my end,

I am not lonely. I am not afraid. I am still yours.

— Robinson Jeffers

(Futility Closet)