print previewback LISA FAY COUTLEY
Leash Training
means trying to make my dog wear blinders
by shoveling fried hot dog bits in his mouth
that—jaws open & yawn wide—is the size
of a dinner plate sailing toward a woman’s face
as she rounds her car to enter the bank
or a small boy pedaling his bike to the beach
baby toddling with kite ANOTHER DOG
swinging children who’ll probably strangle us
with pigtails or tall grasses or they harbor
every barking friend he can hear all night
all drops of chocolate in the baking cake
he’ll never eat if it doesn’t fall to the floor
& who can blame him his lunge & buck
at a leashed end for wanting to blaze
an aspen grove after a herd of elk when
I can’t make myself ignore a single detail—
the way you said my name or toward the end
breathed yeah yeah yeah until you simply didn’t 
Leash Training