Lucky Me (Dedicated to the stray dog who is in my backyard alone on this cold, wintery night)

Lucky me I travel on winds
Over oceans
Through salt grass
Like Harrier Hawks
Floating slowly into headwinds with eyes down
Searching the ground for patterns
Symbols
Signs

I make friends like treasure hunters
Folded maps with creases and smudges
Pinned to my wall with colored tacks
That lose their meaning over the years
If I don't come back
When I don't come back
Weighted in carets of memory
Treasures nonetheless

Lucky me I am a keeper of images

I thumb backward

Ticking off yesterdays one by one

Letting them melt

In a sudden winter thaw

Until they are caught off-guard

By an arctic blast 

That stabs and gnaws into deepest marrow

I wrap my arms 

Around lucky me

This statue that bears witness

To what can be

What should be

Knowing that right around the corner

A wave is cresting onto a rocky shore

Snow is wafting down trees to the forest floor

And a stray dog is eating a can of food 

I surreptitiously left for her

Because it's cold outside and she's alone, abandoned, scared

And lucky me is sitting here

Thinking that I can comfort her with more than tears 

Brattleboro-December 2017
*Note, after finding out that my assumption that The Dog was a "He" I have revised this to fit the "She" that Daisy is.