Two dogs are curled around their space,

sharing the same patchwork coat

and flicker of ear. They sleep, both

close to my father’s after dinner work

with a spade, his shadow over them.

Brothers making trouble mostly,

who know how to run and somersault

faster than their legs can carry,

who rummage noses far below ground –

get buried. Then shrill through yards

of soil, each barks like a Baskerville hound

to come up bleeding at the nose.

Now they lie quiet as if life began

here with this garden and will always be so,

small paws taut in anticipation

of my father’s spade hurling the earth.