You Are Not A Dog

October 24th 2024

Nothing is safe from you.

No matter how I explain that my being a person and taking up space is not a personal attack on your existence

Nor my aspirations a bell to trigger your salivating

If I am in your sight, you will tremble until you can’t take it anymore

You’ll finally lunge and sink your teeth into my vulnerabilities and joys and shake them with violent delight like a Rottweiler shredding a stuffed rabbit

And when I am again heartbroken over the plucked eyeballs and clouds of stuffing strewn across the floor

You will pant wildly, resting on your haunches satisfied and exhausted, and look at me with blank confusion

Was this bunny not for me to disembowel?

Are your things not mine to play with?

I’m just a silly dog.

You can’t get upset with me, that would just mean you’re an emotionally unstable Shrew.

Except…you’re not a dog.

You have a driver’s license and a street address

You’ve had enough relationships, social interaction, and therapy to know better

And so, I’m fairly tired and confused as to why I have to explain to you that it is hurtful to shred and eat up other people’s things simply because you are restless and dissatisfied

But I realized this long before I wanted to admit

Because even a dog lowers their gaze when they see they’ve hurt you

Photo by Oscar Sutton on Unsplash

But not you.

You stick out your bottom lip,

How could you be upset with me?

How was I supposed to know?

I’m just a dog, remember?

But even a dog learns boundaries without me explaining it in a three-page letter.

No, you are something else

Something that practiced resembling a Labrador so you could lay by my fire at night and steal the food from my cupboards.

You are not a dog

But you will never stop behaving like one

And I will never find self-awareness in someone who licks their asshole on my livingroom rug