Dutch Charm

My oldest brother once went on a European tour with his high school band. When he came home, he brought me a tiny Dutch shoe, which I then wore on a silver chain throughout my own high school days.

A  year or two after that trip, my brother brought home a dog. 

She was a Keeshond, a breed that originated in Holland.  

In the brief time she lived with us, I took her for a few walks and knelt by her and tried to comb her long gray fur. I was about fourteen and skinny and clenched my teeth in my sleep. Beside me, she felt like a warm, breathing rock.

Here's a poem about her from my chapbook Of the Forest.*

Walking My Brother’s Dog

  

We were different—

she was Dutch and

I was not—

but we had the same

thick, quiet hair

and eyes that watched.

 

She was strange,

my mother said,

from a place where girls

doused their skin

with perfume

in lieu of bathing.

But I liked to walk

up our curving suburban street

with her. I was a pale

brittle cookie with

cold hands.

She was dark, warm,

substantial,

a steady, silent bear.

 

Who would have guessed

she could move so fast—

one day she sprang forward

and was gone.

 

I stayed on,

preferring to leave

more gradually,

pocketing a handkerchief one year,

sneaking out a slipper the next,

followed by a knitted coin purse,

a pair of silver earrings, a box of

blank note cards, a palm-size radio,

and a felt-tip pen. The last things

I took before I left for good

were a drop of blood

and a sewing kit.

By then I had forgotten

her name but had found

my own weight.

 *This poem was originally published by Verseweavers, with the title "Foreign Exhcange."

Of the Forest was the second place winner of The Poetry Box Chapbook Prize, 2021.