The Dog

The Dog by Francisco Goya
The Dog (El Perro) by Francisco Goya

He’s gone, my leader.
Turned into a bird or some other
uncatchable thing.
The world without him
tastes like a thrown stick.
I don’t know what to do.

I take a running step
& stop: there’s no tug
on my collar,
no comforting rebuke.
I keep trying to call
his name & get
the same old howl.

This week at Poetry Thursday, again the prompt was ekphrasis, but with a prosopopoeic twist: to speak from within the work of art.