Scents of the Past

 

Scents of the Past

  

It’s suffocating, it is. 

A soupy, grey, sunless evening.

Almost rain hovering with damp promises.

At the edge, an orange, post-apocalyptic sky.

But the dog has needs, telegraphed with pleading eyes.

The dog run is a slender green afterthought,

limits set by a black iron fence

and a grey wall that marks the boundary,

spotted with memories in shades of yellow.

Freed, he explodes into the run

searching for the rabbits that run there too,

burrowing under the wall,

teasing with their earthy scents.

He hoovers them up. All old friends by now.

Another dog, a cat, a mouse, the faint smell of petrichor.

He can smell far more than you or me,

100,000 times, enough to sniff out cocaine or cancer,

more than enough to know the past.

Here and there he leaves his own calling card,

a message for friends he seldom sees.

The rain delivers on its promise

 

 

 Brian Cummings

 

Brian Cummings is a retired public relations executive. He started his career as a reporter for a major market newspaper and switched to public relations early in his career. He has written two cookbooks and numerous articles, press releases, and speeches. Two of his poems have been published in the Ariel Chart International Literary Journal. He and his wife, Maureen, live in Allen, Texas.