Brianna brought home a thick collection of children’s poetry last month. Apparently they’d run out of books in the classroom, so the teacher brought in one of her own from home.
I couldn’t resist browsing through, and I came across a nice poem about the dilemma a child is posed with when their beloved pet dies. Although not the obvious choice for a children’s book due to its rather sad and philosophical subject, it is a beautiful poem which I thought was worth sharing. Here it is:
Burying the Dog in the Garden
by Brian Patten
When we buried
the dog in
the garden on
the grave we put
a cross and
the tall man
next door was
cross.
‘Animals have no
souls,’ he said.
‘They must have animal
souls,’ we said. ‘No,’
he said and
shook his head.
‘Do you need a
soul to go
to Heaven?’ we
asked. He nodded
his head. ‘Yes,’
he said.
‘That means my
hamster’s not
in Heaven,’ said
Kevin. ‘Nor is
my dog,’ I said.
‘My cat could sneak
in anywhere,’ said
Clare. And we thought
what a strange place Heaven
must be with
nothing to stroke
for eternity.
We were all
seven.
We decided we
did not want to
go to Heaven.
For that the
tall man next
door is to blame.
This poem brought tears to my eyes and stirred the inevitable discussion of what’s going to happen when George dies. A subject that I’m not very comfortable with and prefer not to think about just yet. At the end of our little talk, Brianna decided that she believes animals have souls and although she’ll be sad when the day comes for George to go, she understands that this is the cycle of life and knows he’ll be up there watching over her. What a wise child. I just blocked out the thought and took George for a walk.
my little dog 