Pup Speak

Okay, for those folks who are still scratching their heads over the Ezra Pound poem, it is actually a parody on a Middle English round written in 1226 called, predictably “Sumer is acumen in”.  It is really very pretty.  Enjoy!

Clovis loves rounds. He is especially fond of “Row, row, row your boat”, especially as sung by the sinks in the Denver Art Museum in Denver, Colorado. Really.

There is a definite chill in the air.  More than a chill, actually, since the thermometer dropped below 40 degrees Fahrenheit last night.  Like all hardy New Englanders, I will put off turning on the furnace until my toes turn to icicles.  At nearly $3.00 a gallon for oil, you can hardly expect me to do otherwise.  On the weekends, when I don’t officially get up until at least noon, although I am usually out of bed by six or even earlier, I wander around the house bundled up in my winter jacket - no simple sweater is sufficient.   If you think that I am perhaps a little too tender for my own good, far from it.  I go out barefoot into the yard in the mornings until the first snow fall and sometimes even after that. It’s cold inside this house.

The dogs are protesting, or at least the French Bulldogs are; Pugs are built for New England winters, covered as they are from head to foot, with a double layer of plush thick fur.   Summer makes them pant and gasp, but winter doesn’t even slow them down.  I have watched in disbelief as my Pugs have leaped joyously off the deck and into snow drifts so deep they momentarily disappeared.  It makes me shudder just to think of it.

Not so my French Bulldogs.  They survive the cold in quiet desperation.  Already my foster dog, Rocket, has taken to slipping quietly under the covers at night and surreptitiously planting his ice cold little feet against my side to warm them.  Cletus, who is apparently claustrophobic, makes do above the covers, warming himself with Pug fur, burying himself as deeply into Clovis’s side as he can fit without entirely upending the Pug.  In the morning, I wrap him in a sweatshirt from the laundry basket, so that he will lie warm and still until I have finished with my shower and can go downstairs to let the dogs out.

This morning, after pushing them bodily outside, protesting all the while, I finally pulled out my twenty year collection of little jackets and sweaters, looking for suitable cold weather gear.  Fitting Rocket was easy.  With his long slender body, he fit beautifully into a green plaid jacket sent to me from Oregon four years ago by a grateful adopter.  Cletus, however, is just too small.   He slouched around in the Pug’s colorful little Fido Fleece jacket, which I bought for those rare occasions when the mercury dipped below zero.  Fahrenheit.   It’s too big for him.  I need to take a tuck in the underside, although I know I never will.  It will have to do, until I can break out my knitting needles and make him a designer sweater, maybe something with cables.  Something manly.

Clovis, of course, in the tradition of all Pugs, will dance naked in the snow all winter…

For those of you not familiar with Ezra Pound, here is the rest of the poem.  Even Ezra Pound could be funny when he wanted to be.

Winter is Icummen in
(Ezra Pound)

Winter is icummen in,
Lhude sing Goddamm,
Raineth drop and staineth slop
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing: Goddamm.
Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham.
Freezeth river, turneth liver
Damn you, sing: Goddamm.
Goddamm, Goddamm, tis why I am,
Goddamm.
So 'gainst the winter's balm
Sing Goddamm, damm, sing Goddamm
Sing Goddamm, sing Goddamm,
DAMM.