In The Senses Of An Alienist Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Three dogs are on my bed;
They fart and drool... And beg.
Each one is my best friend, because
I don’t have to prove anything to their vision,
And I must smell good,
As I give them the treats I take down from
Cabinets made of wood: The forest is getting darker,
And each line is made from the spume of a
Poisonous eel. I write by the light leaping in
A sheep’s bladder, as the waves grow
Passionately sharper. The entire family has not
Resumed. The light house has shut down and is
Not taking orders. My face has lost the definitions
Of well-positioned and youthful borders.
My sister has bought a new car and dedicated it to
Our father.
Tomorrow, two men will come and we will unload
Hay for the horses, then tomorrow I will take down
The gilded harpoon from over the mantle and
Dash it the way it must go between a garden of
Harping dragonflies: In this method, I will take
The dark liver from far in the forest,
Stolen from the hapless giant of granite who I may
Never see, for he passes quietly far away from me;
And I will feed my grandmother, when she asks for me,
And I will think about the other weapon in the darker
Cabinet with a new name for me;
But I am pressed to look upon it, but will I open it.
These are those things I have to say that my
Dogs will never know, and where I must eventually
Go they will not have the path to follow me;
There is no room between the plots of those relations.
Dark corridors which lead all ways across the country,
Disembarking from any house such as this,
But for the time being my hounds border me; they
Snore and fart and dream in the senses of an alienist;
And it is such a sober bliss
That I mustn’t yet take it away from me....