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The Rappy Years
(In memory of Holmdachs Viktor's Rapture)

Rappy died today.
How long ago and yet it seems
as near as now.

I find the living room unbearable
and seek the empty solace of the places
where she never came.
There are no memories upstairs
of soul-deep eyes and gaily dancing feet;
of flying ears and that funny backward dance
she did each night
waiting for her food.

In time, the tearing void will be replaced
by quiet emptiness
and I shall see in my mind's eye
only gentle memories of the Rappy years.
I shall not constantly recall the sudden illness
crashing through our night, the glazed, unseeing
eyes, the final breath.
I shall not always see her, semi-conscious
on the front car seat
or feel her still warm body
close against my own.

There will be instead the way she sat
like some large bosomed dowager
upon the station wagon seat, eyes half closed
in ecstasy, loving every minute of the ride,
Rappy, wanting always to be near, leaving
anything behind just to come along.
Rappy, with her stubborn streak, her independent ways,
her merry heart, pleading with her eyes for only one
more morsel, only one more walk, only one more lick
planted on my nose
to prove how much she cared.

There is a Dachshund with eyes not really almond shaped
filed away forever now in some special niche the heart
reserves
for precious things we've known and lost.
She had a constant love affair with life and
treated everyone as though they were her friend
but spent herself reassuring me in countless ways
not to be concerned
because
she love me best.


By Ann Carey for the American Dachshund magazine, August, 1973. 
Unrelated 1950s Belgian image source unknown. 

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