The Future of Dogs

author’s note:

One dog barks, one hundred dogs bark.
                  -- old Chinese proverb


THE FUTURE OF DOGS

If dogs continue to evolve
perhaps they can
relieve us humans
of certain responsibilities

but then, we as recline
we may decline
--gleefully falling backwards,
   relieved to be relieved,
   we would regress

and when we hit the ground
we'll crawl as we once did
but wouldn't it be easier
just to slither--?--

for that matter,
why not make things even simpler
for ourselves
and shrink down to
the basic life
of the one-cell organism?

Meanwhile, to fill the void
dogs would learn to drive our cars.
They'd work, play, marry, and spend--
experiment, build, and scheme

and in the upheaval of all these activities
--agitated by their continuing evolution,
   by the growth of thought, of feeling
they'd begin to wonder if
behind all this
there might be something more

and thus, some would begin
to try to sniff out the unseen

and if they tracked long enough
maybe one would eventually find a trail
or if not
wouldn't at least one of them
in time become overwhelmed
by the feeling of searching--?--

in either case
that canine would want to express
what can not be spoken

and so begin to howl
from deep, deep down

and when one dog howls
all dogs stop to listen
to the feeling in the sound--
all dogs feel the feeling
and in feeling, also begin to howl

and thus the dogs
would rediscover
their deeper truth--
their better deeper nature:
rediscover
what links them all together.

Only in that way
could they continue to evolve
instead of falling backward

because if their main concern
remained basic survival
their world would be little more
than dog eat dog

and what feeling animal
would want such a civilization--?--
who could blame any of them
for rejecting that life
and retreating into the dark numb world
of the one-cell organism?...

© 2012, Michael R. Patton
myth steps