RDP Tuesday: WATCHED

Domino 16 Weeks Old

When she was a puppy I watched her eyes shine

when she saw you, when she heard your voice,

when you reached down to pet her and reminded her she wasn’t a cat

like her big brother Wolfgang

whom she loved only second to you.

When she got older

and her health failed

she would sleep a lot and take short little walks

and happily wait for you to come home.

When she heard your car door slam and you whistled for her

she would get up and her eyes would shine.

And then Wolfie died and you went away

and that is when I think her heart really started to fail.

For a little while she would lift her head up when she heard a car door slam and she

would wait for your whistle

but of course it never came

and she would let her head fall back to her pillow and she would go back to sleep.

Her eyes, I remember, never really did shine after you left and my heart broke for her

and then part of it hardened.

Now when I think about Domino’s broken

heart and darkened eyes I think of you and my own heart doesn’t break.

It turns to stone.

Domino aged 14 years