Hello everyone, I know thatr this post is really late, but better late than never.... right? As aome of you know I was in Chicago last wee taking care of som family business. I returned home last yesterday and when I returned home I was told some pretty upsetting news. Our family's dog had passed away saturday morning. His name was Babe and he was 13 years old. I remember the first day we got him from the SPCA, he was just 6 weeks old. I remember when we were looking at all the dogs trying to pick one out, he was the only dog in his pen not jumping aorund and barking, he just stood there with a sad look on his face with one paw up on the gate. It was love at first sight, so my family brought him home. I don't know if anyone else has ever felt this way about a pet, but it is really funny how your family's pet can become almost a family memeber, it just does not feel the same without him in our lives. He was an amazing dog and he will be truly be missed. I just wanted to share this poem with everyone in memeory of Babe.
"They called him Rags"
By Edmund Vance Cooke
They called him Rags, he was just a cur
But twice on the Western Line,
That little old bunch of faithful fur
Had offered his life for mine.
And all he got was bones and bread
And the leaving of soldiers' grub,
But he'd give his heart for a pat on the head,
A friendly tickle or rub.
And Rags got home with the regiment,
And then, in the breaking away--,
Well, whether they stole him, or whether he went,
I am not prepared to say.
But we mustered out, some to beer and gruel,
And some to sherry and shad,
And I went back to the Sawbones School,
Where I was an undergrad.
One day they took us budding M.D.'s
To one of those institutes
Where they demonstrate every new disease
By means of bisected brutes.
They had one animal tacked and tied
And slit like a full-dressed fish,
With his vitals pumping away inside
As pleasant as one might wish.
I stopped to look like the rest, of course,
And the beast's eyes leveled mine;
His short tail thumped with a feeble force,
And he uttered a tender whine.
It was Rags, yes, Rags! who was martyred there,
Who was quartered and crucified,
And he whined that whine which is doggish prayer
And he licked my hand--and died.
And I was no better in part nor whole
Than the gang I was found among,
And his innocent blood was on the soul
Which he blessed with his dying tongue.
Well! I've seen men go to courageous death
In the air, on sea, on land!
But only a dog would spend his breath
In a kiss for his murderer's hand.
And if there's no heaven for love like that,
For such four-legged fealtly--well!
If I have any choice, I tell you flat,
I'll take my chance in hell.
