Theo lies on stainless steel.
Golden. Small.
Dropper bottles everywhere.
Homeopathic remedies. Ancient herbs.
Distilled. Mashed. Lost on Theo.
I sit behind him.
He lifts his tail. Lets it drop.
The edge of the examination table is cold
against my breasts. I pull him to me, his spine
against my sternum. I slip my hand
inside his legs. Rest it on his heart.
The nurse is a big woman.
She exudes compassion.
I wish she would go away.
Take the blue walls with her.
The nurse holds Theo’s hind leg
in her stubby fingers.
The needle is small.
She searches for a vein.
“You go, Sweetie Boy,” I say, “You go.”
Sunlight hits the lip of a wooden shutter
then disappears behind the Chinese laundry
in the alley. The nurse presses
on the needle. Theo moans.
“No,” I say, “You go. It’s okay. You go.”
Theo cries out, twists and snaps his teeth.
The nurse removes the needle.
“I’m sorry,” she says, “I thought
I had a vein but I was in muscle.”
Steam escapes from the Chinese laundry.
Shirts are pressed and creased and tied quickly
with just the right amount of string.
The nurse finds a vein in Theo’s front leg
and glides the needle in.
I want to feel what happens next
but I am on the ceiling with my father
twisting the wire stem of the plastic flower
I made at camp around the valves
on the oxygen tank beside his bed.
I can’t imagine life without him.
I am ten so I have hope.
Theo’s heart begins to rumble.
Then is still. The nurse retracts
the empty needle. Turns out the light.
I am alone with the body of my dog.
I pull him near me. His legs slide and slip
in no particular order. His head twists
like a slinky on circular stairs.
I quickly push him back.
Arrange him as he’d arrange himself
on my side of the bed.
The nurse re-enters. She carries
three nasturtiums, their stems wrapped
in a wet piece of paper towel.
She puts them on the corner
of the stainless steel table
nearest the door and tells me to
take my time.
I look in Theo’s eyes.
He is as gone as if he never came.
I pick up my purse. Open the door.
Step into the fluorescent hallway.
Someone laughs at the front desk.
I want to see Theo one more time.
I turn my head toward the dark and as I do
a beam of sunlight defies
the wooden shutters and falls
across my dog. The nasturtiums.
His magnificent paws.