John Pursch lives in Tucson, Arizona. Twice
nominated for Best of the Net, his work has appeared in many literary
journals. A collection of his poetry, Intunesia, is available at http://www.lulu.com/
Clockwork Dogs
It
turned out to be dogs coughing, all this time, these eons. They were patiently,
steadfastly, marking the minutes as a sort of public service, keeping time for
humankind. A best friend, not so easily replaced by wristwatch after all! How
fortunate that bark was far more accurate than bite. The dilatory canine phlegm
fixation, day by hidden hour, by translucent sunrise silhouette, by carefully
shepherded human trundle into pewter fasting, hobbled by irregular rhythmic
groans and mottled cream in cobbled cacophonous dialects of interspecies
interface, relying on denormalized unitary lurches of penny-ante lorries,
waxing wagon wheels, turpentine evaporating in midday sun. Meanwhile, way out
west, random bipeds were slinging lead at a thousand feet per second,
staggering from dry deserted ghastly wooden towns to rivers full of foolish
pyrite wishing wells, pressing fat of hand to iron butt of cigarette polonium,
speckling the years with flecks of splintered wood, bleaching bones, quiet
horses, and the vast uncounted dispossessed of canyon, plain, and forest;
shrouded wanderers who calmly went the way of coughing clockwork dogs.
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