Vox Populi
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Charles Harper Webb: Bad Dog
You know how Good Dog can sniff out
the fiend-in-human form—
how it growls, howls, slinks away
even as the fiend’s jokes, fine manners,
handsome face and cobalt eyes charm everyone?
Bad Dog licks killers’ bloody hands,
leaps with joy for rapists, fawns at politicians’
crooked feet. “He’s an awful judge
of character,” the owner tells kind-hearted
strangers who scuttle past as the dog strains
to break its chains and savage them.
Meeting a human who owns better clothes,
a bigger house, more influential friends,
Bad Dog tags behind without a thought
for its old home, the bereft children whimpering.
It tail-wags, gives its Let’s play! bow,
and generally turns up the doggie charm
till the new sucker takes it in. Ex-owners
call Bad Dog “Man’s worst friend.” It even tracks
down a guy that people claim can raise
the dead, and feed a crowd with a single minnow
and a cup of slime. It bays like a hell-hound
until soldiers come and drag the gentle soul,
in sandals and a threadbare robe, off to the crown-
of-thorns and cross that make a god of him.
~~~~
Poem copyright 2025 Charles Harper Webb
A former professional rock singer/guitarist and licensed psychotherapist, Charles Harper Webb is Professor of English at California State University, Long Beach. His collections of poetry include Sidebend World (Pitt, 2018).
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A favorite poem about human-dog communication is Robert Wrigley’s Religion. Today’s poem by Charles Harper Webb brought me back to Wrigley’s gem. Nice bookends.
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I’m confused by whether this poem is a good dog or a bad dog.
Maybe your answer depends upon which kennel you were bred in.
Others, with a better developed nose for these things, might bay the resolution, though not all poems are constructed (or deconstructed) that way.
I like how the author has built his roll-over model for a good dog. But like many a good poem, it may turn on you.
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A bad dog is a good dog protecting her family.
>
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Growing up, my dog Shy lived up to her name except when trouble for us arose, especially for me, a young boy. Then she was a ferocious defender. You are correct. Good dog/bad dog depends on circumstances. Back in Houston with loose dogs around, you had to read a dog as much as a dog had to read you. Great poem, btw
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