Alanna Bailey
Light
Cosmo and Light. The dogs I was raised with
were the size of small ponies. All our dogs
found us, all mutts. Cosmo must have had some
Collie; my little fingers tangled in
fistfuls of his yam and honey shag when
I’d try to ride him or attach him to
my tricycle—he would growl and snap,
refuse to pull it like a horse. Light was
half-wolf. They say wolves are born deaf and blind,
underground. She found us in the canyon;
serene, circumspect, gentle, followed us
home. She explained the recent lack of coyotes
bothering the yard, the unfamiliar croon
my parents had been hearing waft through the hills
at night, the sound ringing like an eerie tinnitus,
tickling the jacaranda into gossip with the eucalyptus,
all the leaves in an efferent bustle around the house…
People whispered too, would glance twice at the pair,
their easy saunter, their size next to mine,
Light’s close ears and wild brindle, her ability
to disappear behind us on our evening walks,
only to emerge and encircle to the front
of my stroller when people were coming up ahead.
For years, when I woke from naps or bad dreams,
Light would be there waiting for me. She’d let me
grab the scruff of her neck and run with me
down the long halls to find my parents. When she
was on her deathbed, Light vanished— sequestered herself
amid the wood block and canvas heaps of Mom’s studio—
once found, laying pained, panting on the cement floor,
mom knelt to console her, stroke that wild fur, to thank her.
Light bit her. Clamped her teeth into Mom’s fingers,
sent her reeling for first aid while Light died there quietly.
The next day I started to lose my hearing—slight high-pitched
ringing from the deep of my inner ear, a resounding sound,
near choral, like the worlds smallest wolf howling
a bawdy falsetto telling me when to stop and when to go.