The dog won’t even pull at the leash anymore: 
we’re both tired from the uphill hike. The day 
runs out of light behind an old sycamore. From 
neighbor’s homes come the kitchen jingles I love:
cymbals of silverware drawers, a lid’s tap dance 
on a pan. Silhouettes shift against TV flickers. 
The dog & I are the only ones left in the street 
now, & it comes to me that we could be a perfect 
image in a Tranströmer poem: an old widow 
& her black dog in a dusk-dark street. But just 
as we enter our house, the new moon shines her
bright grin through the kitchen’s open window, 
& the mockingbird finally breaks into one of his 
delirious nocturnes — pure & zealous & breathless.