INSPIRATION

            This little dog tucked in beside my lap
            And the half-cocked recliner chair’s soft arm
            Accompanies me on our amusing trip
            To Serendip, lulled by my rhyming’s charm,

            And while I keep the beat and seek to chime
            My lines according to the sonnet’s scheme,
            She softly breathes as if to mark the time
            Or shudders in the action of her dream.

            A little twitch suggests she’s in pursuit
            Of someone swiftly fleeing up ahead—
            A backyard squirrel or a lakeside coot—
            Or yet some other speedy quadruped.

                 And thus again, though sleeping, she inspires
                 The matter that this would-be poem requires.

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