MAX TRILOGY

2008-11-13T16:58:00.000-08:00

Max Came Named

a brown-eyed, tan and white something like a collie

A dubious dog, at best. One of the neighbor-farmers said

he looked like a coyote and surely was no dog for a woman

who had never owned a dog before.

I didn't know his history then: three different owners,

how he was beaten, dumped, passed over by the shelter

as too far gone, then picked up by a local group,

the last best hope of hopeless mutts. I called. he was delivered

on a leash, and I was told, with lots of love

he'll come around.

What was I thinking? What had I done?

People like me shop second-hand for chunks of real life

enhanced by others' use. But I was no reformer.

Max didn't whine or bark; he hardly looked at me.

A smart dog that wouldn't bite the hand

that feeds him, but for petting, no hands on anywhere.

So for weeks and weeks I talked to him non-stop,

telling him what good dogs need to do, as we went walking

through late winter snow, March mud, for miles each day.

And where this story's going is to a time some months along

when I came home to find him waiting at the door,

standing there eyeing me, his tail almost wagging, surprised himself

to find himself standing there eyeing me, his tail almost wagging.

Snaking

Nothing slithered past Max. Any S in the grass and he'd pounce:

his dog teeth clamped on a blur of shaking, and a let-go that

would send it 15 ft. in any direction. So a particular summer A.M.

I'm upstairs out of the shower, my morning mind

on toast and coffee. when an airborne snake hits the window

and falls on the porch roof. The snake seems hurt, but still alive.

The hot day is getting hotter. Bothered by the thought

of a slow snake-fry. I crank out the casement,

get to where no 60 year old woman ought to be in her pink bathrobe

and slippers, broom in one hand, dustpan in the other.

Max is in the garden looking up. He is as innocent as morning dew.

I slip along toward 20 inches of coming-alive snake.

Broom for an alpenstock. I'm sliding anyway on asphalt shingles,

guaranteed for life. Snake picks up the tango,

but won't glide my way and these, my maybe last thoughts, line up

half-way between the rain gutters and the bathroom window.

I'm standing on a porch roof in Daleville, PA.

Here's to things that resist their rescue and their rescuers.

that won't cooperate in their own clean up. I turn and

sweep the snake over the edge, toss the broom,

drop the dustpan to the sidewalk with a noise that rings.

I'm climbing back to a safe hut on the face of the Matterhorn.

There's is no mountaineer to save this crazy old-lady's ass.

Max, content, paws some snake part or other. And what I can't see

isn't happening.

PUBLISHED FIRST IN Iconoclast

Keeping Max Alive

One Reglan morning and night, and one prednisone

every morning half an hour before feeding,

given with one quarter of one Imuran

for the first seven days, then every other day

for as long as he lives. Because of the steroids he needs a walk

every three hours, and I need to monitor his urine for color

and his feces for texture, and both for odor, because says Dr. Ron

(who calls himself Dr. Ron) Your doggy has a really bad tummy

The disgnosis in my dog book says massive digetsive failure.

And I'm new at this. No nursing, no vigils

for my near and dear who blessedly drop dead

of heart attacks and aneurysms.

So I try to run this hospice the best way I can.

Some good days, some bad, says Dr. Ron,

and you'll know when it's time.

My daughter who doesn't believe in death

and warned me she won't read my living will,

waves off the news about my dog. She answers with an ad

for a holistic vet and lists of healing herbs.

Her note in red pen says that borage oil will do the trick.

Max stays close to his water dish, his ears flat, nose on the floor.

His fur comes out in tufts like spores or thistles.

His trick has always been to find and point.

He is sleeping with one eye open, ready to run

the last rabbit down the last hole.

PUBLISHED FIRST IN The Hollins Critic

Annette Basalyga

MAX TRILOGY