Old Dog

Her food and water live across the room.
She has a thought. She lifts her nose. She measures
and weighs effort and risk, her hunger’s bloom,
the long, slick floor between her and her pleasures,

and then decides. Long stretches—fore, then hind—
and she sets off, her stiff legs under control,
eyes on the prize, just one thing on her mind.
Listing only slightly, she reaches the goal—

—and then just stands there, rueful and perplexed,
inches from Paradise without a clue.
She sits. She stares at the wall, not sure what’s next,
how she has come there, what she had meant to do.

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Jane Greer

Jane Greer edited Plains Poetry Journal (1981-1993), an advance guard of the New Formalism movement. Her poetry collections include Love like a Conflagration (2020) and The World as We Know It Is Falling Away (2022), both from Lambing Press. Greer gave a weeklong series of readings in Pittsburgh, Steubenville, and St. Paul last fall. She lives in North Dakota.

Also by Jane Greer (see all)

• “A poet, dangerous and steep”:reintroducing Josephine Jacobsen - February 19, 2023
• “The beloved spectator who is myself”: Mary Jo Salter, Socially Distanced - September 21, 2022
• “What Is There I Will Not Let Go?”: Two New Books by Rachel Hadas - May 22, 2022

Author: Jane Greer

Jane Greer edited Plains Poetry Journal (1981-1993), an advance guard of the New Formalism movement. Her poetry collections include Love like a Conflagration (2020) and The World as We Know It Is Falling Away (2022), both from Lambing Press. Greer gave a weeklong series of readings in Pittsburgh, Steubenville, and St. Paul last fall. She lives in North Dakota. View all posts by Jane Greer