Ode To Joy!

Burren

One must have a mind of a dog,

To experience utter joy in rot! Exuberance

Rolled, with a great body thump, head first

Onto death.  A hearty sniff, a gleam of eye,

Wide grin, the ears hit decay first, followed

By furry cheek and thwack of shoulder on  

Carcass. Be it worm, rodent or dead coyote -

All is an ode to joy! Festering stink,

Maggoty ruin, skull or pelt – for every dog a

Feast and bath.  

For what does the human engage wholeheartedly?

One must have the mind of a dog

To leap and bounce at the jingle of harness

And rope, land explored as it were India or

The tropics! A cacophony of scent and color,

Pulsing heartbeats of deer and possum lain

Down in scat and track.  Exuberance magnified

by allure of musk and skunk.  Overripe berries and

browning apples equally gobbled and

swallowed.

While we, one second short of burnout, scrabble on short leashes, cagey, our own choosing. 

Turnip