Keeper

• Alexandra Adornetto, Grade 9
• Poetry
• 2006

Keeper

Don’t be scared, I know the white coats and strange faces must alarm you.
Just keep still. You must be wanting your cosy basket.
Not long now. I’ll squeeze your paw in my hand to comfort you.
Who is this man raising a tube in his white gloved hand?
And what does he want smiling coolly as you flinch at his touch?

I close my eyes and remember how you were my horse as an infant,
my friend when I had been bad. Remember that Christmas held out in the yard when everyone was calling to you and you came to me?
It wasn’t so long ago that you jumped at the jingle of your leash,
and guarded that battered tennis ball with your life.
But as time wore on you began to grow weary, deaf and thin.

I open my eyes and want to cry out. But I am too late.
You have already gone. Now all I can do is say a silent prayer,
that you find a castle made of bones and a new ball to chase.

So I’ve written you a poem, Keeps, which will sit beside your photograph.
That way, my thoughts of you will last forever.