i don’t like thinking about police dogs
but i still think about when i was in high school
locked out of the field with my teammates
watching them train a dog to attack
i just think there was a better time and a better place
than right outside a middle school
in the middle of the afternoon
with more than a few teenagers within earshot
i don’t like thinking about police dogs
because i hate thinking about the lovely life they could’ve had
that dog was definitely not fully grown
but it definitely wasn’t a puppy
i’m sure it had a snippet of a good life
a snippet of youth
before it was taken away from it
i wonder if their siblings were with them at least
or if they had to say goodbye to them too
i think dogs deserve a good life
full of fun and blind joy and love
with a happy family that loves them
caring for them because they can and they want to
not raising them to raise a tool
they deserve to run around in the park
tongue half-contained in their mouth
chasing their ball
or another dogs tail
surrounded by smiles and laughter
their family calling their name
and turning around mid-chase
to find them smiling so fondly after them
or maybe their life has more
perfectly-placed sun rays
filtering through the windows
warming a perfect patch on the hardwood floor
and they spend their best moments sprawled there
their human sitting nearby
or maybe even curled up beside them
that’s the type of lives i thing dogs should have
i don’t like thinking about police dogs
because i think about how they don’t get that life
and how they were chosen from youth
maybe even from birth
to fill a certain role
to take on a certain job
and they don’t get to have that type of fun
and if they do it’s only a reward
they have to deserve it in a different way
compared to deserving it from the get-go
and i wonder if they ever crave that calm life
or if they even know it exists
so caught up in what they’re told to do
what they’re raised to do
that they never think of the life they could have
the life they’re supposed to have
being part of a family
not being an asset
not being part of an organization
having people that love them for being them
i don’t like thinking about police dogs
because i think about myself too much
because i wonder if those dogs think about the life that had for a moment
if they remember it at all
or if it’s blotted out by their responsibilities now
because i wonder if they miss it at all
or if they like what they have now
if only because it gives them a structure
because i wonder if they know the love they deserve
or if they think wanting it makes them weak, too
because i wonder if they feel at all
and if they don’t if they know they should
or if they try but it’s just too hard, too
because i wonder if they struggle with it
balancing how human they know they should be
with everything demanded of them
pleading in their own brain the mantra
i wanna be soft i wanna be soft i wanna be soft
on endless repeat
or thinking about whatever the dog version of feeling human is
because i wonder if they ever get so caught up in it all
that it becomes the only thing they identify themselves with
and they end up impossibly lost
as soon as they don’t have it anymore, too
i don’t like to think about police dogs
so i tried not to think about the one they were training
outside the field when my coach arrived
and i tried to think about anything else
than the snarls and growls and shouts
as we stretched and ran
and tried not to think too hard
about why police dogs make me so upset
— k-9
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