Wag, Bark, Remember
By Venkatesh Govindarajan
An Animal Rights Poem from All-Creatures.org

All of God's creatures have rights, a fact that most people don't seem to recognize. This includes both human and non-human animals, but not all of them can speak for themselves.

Wag, Bark, Remember
By Venkatesh Govindarajan, Senior Lecturer, Karlstad University, Sweden

He stood and wagged his tail.

It was 2 o’clock in the morning.

As the cab started moving,

he barked, in anger that I was leaving.

He followed the cab for a few metres,

I saw him stop, turn and walk away.

Perhaps he knew that I would be back,

in about six months to that day.

It was just a few biscuits daily;

I’d given him while I stayed there.

Half-a-year later, he would still remember,

thankfulness expressed in his silent stare.

‘A stray dog after all’, you would say,

‘there are so many around, you know.’

‘Yes, but I think of myself as a stray man,

happy to have a dog in tow.’

stray dog


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