Turning the Dogs
- Turning the Dogs
In boxes they cry out.Bellows ring through the tatterof tails against black barsand nails claw linerfrom a steel pickup bed.Latches and locks dropa muffled stampedeof paws to the ground.Hear the scratch of broomsage bowed to their belliesand briar-beat teats,cracked from this year'slitter. In cotton pocketstheir masters fumble shells,shuffle boots in the frostand mud, kick up the breathof morning as it risesin a purple sun,bruised with opening day.That invisible wellingrustled in the dead leaves'crunch, taste of rabbitrolled back and chamberedin their throats. Firstyelps sound—cut tracks—and round the packback to the bend wherehunters howl and shedtheir shape of men. [End Page 121]
Originally from central Mississippi, Adam Moore is a PhD (Poetry) student at the Center for Writers at the University of Southern Mississippi. His recent work appears or is forthcoming in Valley Voices and New Limestone Review.
