Malak Mattar, Untitled (detail), 2024, charcoal on paper
My Dog Earl
His forelegs trochee and his rear legs iamb!
I have it all on minicam:
My dog, Earl, at 4:36 a.m.,
Having completed an olfactory exam
Of my brokeback copy of Green Eggs and Ham,
Raises his piebald right-rear ham
To pee, and I admit I am
Startled by the stream: poor Sam-I-Am!
No Boulder Dam,
No midnight Harlem jam,
No Mary’s little lamb,
No thin men of Haddam
Ever let flow ad nauseam—
A patois to match my Earl’s salaam.
His forelegs trochee and his rear legs iamb!
Daniel Bosch is director of the Writing & Publishing program at Walnut Hill, a high school for the arts in Natick, Massachusetts. (updated 7/2009)