NOTE FROM LB
A public service message from The Navajo Dog. Listen up, kids, cuz unlike us humans she always knows what she’s talking about, even if we can’t figure it out.
Basic Training (Courtesy Of The Navajo Dog)
by Larry Brody
The Navajo dog is a schemer,
A sage who teaches with tricks, threats, and lies.
She makes things real as they are needed,
Pushing and prodding to set souls into the places
She deems proper so her lessons will spring to life.
No cost is too high for the Navajo dog to pay,
Nor too much for her to ask of such as we.
She demands all, and in return gives everything she has.
When I asked her one day (oh so long, it seems,
So long, long ago!) why she did things this way,
Why she didn’t lead Socratically with the truth,
The Navajo dog barked a short laugh,
And pawed at the dry earth. As she dug deeper,
The dirt grew more moist,
Darkening into a wholeness that no longer could be
Chipped or fragmented away.
“This is truth, ignorant boy,” she said.
“This is the true Mother Earth. The deeper we
Get the more is she alive. All of her is one,
A wholeness that dries into scattered bits
When brought up to the sun. Your mother
Does not throw herself at you, and expose
Her innards. She hides, and makes you find her,
Plants clues—lies!—to tempt you and tease you
And lead you ever on. You must dig and dig and dig
Past the desert’s dead surface,
To find the truth of this world,
Just as you must dig and dig and dig
Past the desert dog’s lies.”
“And what you tell me now,” I asked,
“Is this the truth? Or is there something deeper
For which I must search?”
The Navajo dog stuck her muzzle into the
Hole she had made, clamped her teeth
On a shard of bone. “If I scratched my way
Down to the center of the earth,” she said,
“Would there still be someplace deeper to go?”
I heard the bone crack between her jaws,
Watched her swallow the fragments.
“Always,” I said. “Always something deeper.”
The Navajo dog yipped and pranced off.
“What do you say we go hunting?” she called back to me,
“And find ourselves something a little more alive?”
###
ANOTHER NOTE FROM LB
If you enjoyed this poem, you probably would like my book of poetry, Kid Hollywood and the Navajo Dog, available at Amazon.Com for an unlimited time for exactly $0.00. Yes, you read that correctly. Free. More than a Christmas present, this is my life present to you all.
Go straight to Amazon and avail yourself of all the delicious goodness simply by clicking HERE. (And if you like it, it would be great if you wrote a review. No pressure, but eventually someone’s got to, right?)
Many thanks.
Larry Brody is the head dood at TVWriter™. He is posting at least one poem a week here at TVWriter™ because, as the Navajo Dog herself once pointed out, “Art has to be free. If you create it for money, you lose your vision, and yourself.” She said it shorter, though, with just a snort.