When the world feels too much, too scary, too overwhelming, too helpless, my dog brings me back to his world, the world of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. The world of warm fur, small thudding heart, searching eyes I feel gazing at me until I lift my eyes to his and he thuds his tail rapidly, over and over again, shifting on his front paws and willing me to motion for him to jump up onto my lap to push his cold nose against me and butt me with his head harder than you think he’d be capable of until I pet him. Over and over and over he wants to be petted, and over and over and over I pet him until he’s ready to get on with his day, his stores of affection and attention, and mine, having been renewed.

Claim, by Kasey Jueds

Once during that year
when all I wanted
was to be anything other
than what I was, the
dog took my wrist
in her jaws. Not to hurt
or startle, but the way
a wolf might, closing her mouth
over the leg of another
from her pack. Claiming me
like anything else: the round luck
of her supper dish or the bliss
of rabbits, their infinite
grassy cities. Her lips
and teeth circled
and pressed, tireless
pressure of the world
that pushes against you
to see if you’re there,
and I could feel myself
inside myself again, muscle
to bone to the slippery
core where I knew
next to nothing
about love. She wrapped
my arm as a woman might wrap
her hand through the loop
of a leash—as if she
were the one holding me
at the edge of a busy street,
instructing me to stay.

​Click here for more information about Kasey Jueds (pronounced Judds). Today’s poem is from her book Keeper​, published in 2013 by the University of Pittsburgh Press.
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