For The Love of Dolores

For The Love of Dolores

I

A newspaper article said

Mr. Thomas Moline was killed on his way

to the vet.

Dolores, his terrier, was sick

from eating rancid meat

out of the neighbor's trash.

II

Mickey Mouse smiled from Theresa's

t-shirt,

she was on her way

to Miller's Drug

for a root beer float

and the crosswalk changed from red

to green.

She moved into the street

in front of Mr. Moline's brown blazer

in which Dolores

was losing the neighbor's garbage

and Mr. Moline was, understandably,

preoccupied.

He turned; a ray of low, afternoon sun blinded

him and when he saw Theresa he was almost too

late, but not quite---

he swerved, missing her by inches

and rolled over the side of Mason's bridge into Mule's

Ear creek.

III

They pulled Mr. Moline and Dolores

from the cold water in the dark

while the patient vet from Johnstown,

just over the county line, wondered

if Dolores had suddenly gotten better.