Nachtmare

I had a horrible dream the other night
And in its fold I was a quiver with fright.
A man scolding his dogs berating them with words
Lashing them with whips and cutting with swords.
I tried to walk past him as if uncaring and unaware
But I knew he spied me as I walked past there.
A blonde dog all injured and bloody howled with pain
As my feet tried with all their might for inches to gain.
I kept looking at my paper trying to walk away
As the man loomed just behind me in the fray.
I finally was able to cross the street in fear
All the while looking back, his eyes all a sear.
I sought out the one who’d come to my aid
And was told just where you presently stayed.
I came begging and pleading with no result.
You’d hear none of it, my words were an insult.
I woke crying and sobbing, wondering at the dream.
What of the man and the dogs and my quiet scream?
I knew why I cried as suddenly it dawned on me.
Those dogs were my children and the cruel man me.
The rage that had been building in my life centered in hate
Around the ones I love and realized it a little too late.
They had been taken away and it was something you couldn’t forgive.
No matter how much you had loved me in the past with this you couldn’t live.
Banished and gone from your life was I
Never to feel your arms wrapped around me as I cry.
Daylight hit and I made a solemn and sacred vow
The rage would die though I didn’t know how.
I’d control it and kill it or else lose it all.
I knew love was more powerful and refused to fall.
It all boiled down to how I knew that through time
You’ve loved me without fail, reason, or rhyme.
I knew I didn’t want to lose my children or you.
I may have lost everything else and it seems like my life is through
But I know that love can defeat rage and hate
And that it’s never, for this dog anyway, too late.