His Voice

He sidles,

                  His tail between his legs,

Wandering worriedly into the light

The yellow circle of jaundiced light

Cast by a solitary lamp-post.

And he stares

At his reflection,

That area of shadow that strangely resembles

Him:

His dog-eared, long-faced, panting visage.

And he lets out a sound

A slight, slow, halting, tentative…whine

And it grows, in volume, in size, in shrillness

Till his whining fills the night

With delight, in his own voice

Not his masters.

And he sits… there

And he whines

The lamp-post, the dog, and his shadow

In a circle of sodium light

A picture for posterity

With sound effects.