You are named after the seventh day,
or was it Diego? No matter,
you are the middle name of Alejandro, 
Teresa’s father. That is enough.

You arrived as a moon phase,
mostly black, a crescent tie of white,
and when you run across the lawn at night,
the sun reflected off the moon
reflected off your chest
appears like a journeying god
riding a chariot.

Your father was a show champion
with papers, but you were much too young
to be divided from your mother’s tit.
We nursed you, and everyday
I wrapped you in your berthing sheet
and carried you out onto the grass
where Alejandro once sipped mate.

Now you follow me wherever I go,
lie on my doorstep at night,
bark when the Post Maker nears me.

But, why do you follow me on my wood-walks,
bark at the rabbit and quail?
startle the song birds into silence?

Why do you chase the grazing horses
and not the opossum and fox?

Why do you kill the nutrias,
and steal from Diana her portion of meat?

The barn is the neutral zone
where you and the New Moon stand off,

and so is the Wood, where
the Lady of the Violets resides

when she is not anointing grass,

or chiding you with her finger.