Crating the Big Black Dog

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CRATING THE BIG BLACK DOG

                or, A Treatise on Systematic Theology



The way a shadow stays

a step ahead, or maybe

how a sun-spot, dancing

in the ken's periphery,

forever scuttles out of reach:


either way, He's back behind the couch

again—(the big black God)—

crouched in the slender space

we rarely stoop to look,


abiding there, a nick-

beyond the stretch of our

groping fingers. Here

is where He’ll linger.


When, at last, we corner

Him, cram Him in a crate 

(so we can shut our eyes a bit,)

it'd be a leap to say our rest

is satisfactory.

                        Dearest,


something tells me

He wants out.


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