We all go through our days surrounded by ghosts.
Call them what your want: memories or spirits or energies or auras or guardian angels. They're hovering over us when we wake up in the morning. They sit down to breakfast with us when the smell of coffee burns the air, hitch rides with us to work or school. At lunchtime, they share bites of our crackers and cheese. Maybe they go for walks along the Lake Superior shoreline with us or watch America's Got Talent and eat pizza with us. And, at night, they brush their spectral teeth and crawl under the covers with us.
Billy Collins is haunted by his dead dog . . .
The Revenant
by: Billy Collins
I am the dog you put to sleep,
as you like to call the needle of oblivion,
come back to tell you this simple thing:
I never liked you--not one bit.
When I licked your face,
I thought of biting off your nose.
When I watched you toweling yourself dry,
I wanted to leap and unman you with a snap.
I resented the way you moved,
your lack of animal grace,
the way you would sit in a chair to eat,
a napkin on your lap, knife in your hand.
I would have run away,
but I was too weak, a trick you taught me
while I was learning to sit and heel,
and--greatest of insults--shake hands without a hand.
I admit the sight of the leash
would excite me
but only because it meant I was about
to smell things you had never touched.
You do not want to believe this,
but I have no reason to lie.
I hated the car, the rubber toys,
disliked your friends and, worse, your relatives.
The jingling of my tags drove me mad.
You always scratched me in the wrong place.
All I ever wanted from you
was food and fresh water in my metal bowls.
While you slept, I watched you breathe
as the moon rose in the sky.
It took all of my strength
not to raise my head and howl.
Now I am free of the collar,
the yellow raincoat, monogrammed sweater,
the absurdity of your lawn,
and that is all you need to know about this place
except what you already supposed
and are glad it did not happen sooner--
that everyone here can read and write,
the dogs in poetry, the cats and the others in prose.
Tonight, the spirit of my friend, Helen, nudged me.
Every third Thursday, Helen hosted an open mic called Out Loud at her Joy Center--a little artist retreat she created in the middle of the woods. Friends and creatives would gather to share stories and poems and songs and, sometimes, visual artwork. Without fail, Out Loud has gone on every month, in one form or another, for close to 20 years, even during the pandemic.
I was on a walk around 7:30 this evening when the ghost of Helen texted me via my wife: "Weren't you supposed to have Out Loud tonight? It's the third Thursday."
I inherited Out Loud when Helen passed two years ago, and, up until today, I've kept Helen's streak unbroken. When I got home from my walk, I talked about it with my wife. Should I just forget about it? Should I send out a last-minute email, inviting people to a shortened Out Loud? I didn't know what to do.
Then the ghost of Helen nudged me again through my wife. "Why don't we just share with each other? You can read something, and then I'll read something."
So that's what we did. I rang Helen's bell and read a few of her poems (she always gets the first word). Then I shared a blog post about my recently deceased aunt, flipped through my journal and read rough drafts of a few poems. My wife brought out her journal and read some of her rough drafts. My puppy got into the act, too, barking wildly when she saw a squirrel out the window. (It felt like a rebuke, because she just got a haircut today and is not happy.)
As I said, ghosts surround us all the time. Helen's ghost made sure that Out Loud happened and the streak remained unbroken.
Now Saint Marty just hopes his puppy doesn't unman him with a snap while he's sleeping tonight.
❤️
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