Farewell, Jake.

Just found out that Meredith had to put Jake down. Oh, Jake. You were a good dog.

Jake:  1996-2010

ODE TO DOGS by Michael Meyerhofer

I am tired of hearing about dogs

used as metaphors for the uncivilized.

Imagine a world in which humans

possessed at least twenty times

as many olfactory receptors,

able to distinguish the tang of cancer

rising musk-like from the bedsheets

next to a smoldering ash tray,

able to detect that one drop of blood

in every five quarts of water,

to know what you did last night

no matter how many times

you soap-scrubbed the evidence.

It does not take savagery

but more love than we can muster

to lick the hand you've sniffed,

to love despite the perfume of sins

we wear each day like a halo.