“Arf!” I barked,
hoping she’d acknowledge my existence.
No luck. A woman with a dog
is more content
than any woman
with a man. Dogs
love unconditionally;
not men. Dogs
want food and attention:
men want a threesome,
it’s their dream.
The fate of all men
is to lose domestic bliss
to a bigger cock on
somebody else. More
money. More power. More
skilled appreciation for the
Westminster Kennel Cub
once a year. You
take her to a movie, she spies
a border terrier. “Look how smart and clever!
They go down little holes to catch the rats.”
Men wish they could be buried in the yard
beneath the roses, just like Rusty.
Instead they’re carted-off,
ashed inside a furnace;
dumped within a box
some public place
beside their mother.
One redeeming feature
of a woman with a dog:
for men allergic to cats,
that’s worse.

Selected byLawrence George
Image credit:Doloresz Dombi

Lance Jencks has been writing poetry for fifty years. In the 1970s he earned an MFA in Playwriting and a PhD in Contemporary Theatre. In the 1980s he published his verse-based roman á clef, "The Wisdom of Southern California," then toured that region with a one-man show of the same name. Lance has been an advertising copywriter, a stock-and-bond broker, and the guy who hooks your car to the chain at the car wash. He lives today in Newport Beach, California, where he was recently featured in the epic bodysurfing movie "Dirty Old Wedge" on Amazon.