Undiscovered Country

Here's one downside to having dog: you outlive them all except, possibly, your last one.

                                                         Undiscovered Country

                                                 One-by-one, my dogs have run ahead
                                                 as scouts to sniff at rank mortality.
                                                 They’ve shown me how to grow
                                                 grey and stiff and deaf - and doze all day.
                                                 As pups, they took pride in giving me
                                                 the sticks they scampered to fetch,
                                                 while I took joy in their giving,
                                                 but once they staggered into a deeper sleep,
                                                 they could bring nothing back to save me
                                                 the twitch and whimper of my own dreams
                                                 or the darkness of that final fetching.