Psychopomp


I’m told to go 
in my mind 
to a place where 
I feel safe, and ask 
for a sign. 

A large dog 
with long hair— 
perhaps a seeing-eye dog— 
shows up and leads me 
through the Prophets.

I hold the harness, 
and we walk in sunlit grass
down into a tunnel
the walls of which 
are whale ribs. The dog
is gone. The Sign of Jonah:
Repentance.

I am belched up
onto the grass; I blink
against the glaring day.
In the distance: the same 
stone steps I sat on when
the dog appeared. 

He is there now, alert,
watching me make my way.

​
©2016 Joyce S. Brown