One morning after hitting snooze on the biological clock I realize I’m suffering from Chronic Puppy Lust at the age of nineteen and a half. I cannot get enough. Burly Doodles, pop-eyed Shelties, floppy Lhasa Apsos. They are all mine, in my thoughts and in my dreams. But not in my apartment, so my snaggle-toothed landlord tells me. 

I pass these canine beauties on the street where I stop mid-sentence, gawk, and steal caresses when their owners are not looking. As I stalk by on my bicycle, I ogle at a particularly handsome dachshund trotting across the street. I would name him Zuzu. I can see his fat little head resting on his gilded neck rolls — up the curb I go! I better pay attention to the road. 

His belly sways and brushes the ground with each pouchy trot. I switch gears. Fur drapes his savory oblongness like taupe faux velvet cascading off the back of a — what about this tilting — his ears perk up! — Incline!

My left foot becomes the kickstand and snags across four squares of sidewalk as the ground falls up towards me.  I look down to see a red once-yellow flip-flop as Zuzu trots around the corner. 

So I swim through the air, my gills the pedals, leaving an orphan trail of A positive, feeling the wound’s mouth suck for air. Lips flapping, “So you can find your way back home,” the booboo moans.

Today is Sunday, and Sundays are for unwatched football and phone calls from mothers. This week she’ll keep me on the line as she explains how doves mate for life, but the mister from the pair that perch on the feeder outside, well; daddy’s hit him with the truck. 

So now it’s just Mrs. Lone Love-Dove who sits awkwardly, shrugging off Mr. Woodpecker’s unwanted advances.  Stoplight. I wipe off, catching a gob of pouting flesh. White and weeping like raw poultry. I want to call my mother. 

I am reminded, or perhaps trying to forget, oyako donburi, mother chicken and child egg meal in a bowl, floating in a pool of crinkle-cut carrot teriyaki, buffet style, as the always solo loveless love-dove wheels herself across North Park and Main, motherless, childless, and puppy-less.