Mountain Dog by Margarita Engle Page B

starlight.
    I don’t have a two-way radio
    or my cell phone, which probably
    wouldn’t even get a signal
    way out here.
    So I can’t call for help.
    I’m stuck waiting. I know the rules.
    A lost person should stay in one place,
    hug a tree, avoid wandering
    in wider and wider
    aimless
    circles.…
    Instead, I panic and run
    until I’m sliding down
    a long, steep
    s
    Â Â l
    Â Â Â o
    Â Â Â Â Â p
    Â Â Â Â Â Â e
    scrambling
    to keep from falling
    over a cliff.
    This is stupid.
    I should know better.
    I might not always listen
    to every boring grown-up rule,
    but I am old enough to have
    common sense.
    So I make myself stop.
    I stand motionless,
    waiting.
    The forest is crowded with SAR dogs
    and searchers. If B.B. and the other
    ground pounders don’t find me,
    then Gabe and Tío surely will.
    Won’t they?
    I sit with my back against
    an incense cedar tree,
    where the red bark smells
    like the smoky air
    around those praying women
    in the prison yard—thick air
    clouded with incense
    and gloom.

    So many emotions churn
    through my head that I feel
    like a baby elephant
    trying to learn how to use
    its long
    clumsy nose.
    On my birthday, I never
    would have guessed that twelve
    could feel so young
    and small
    and complicated.
    Anger. At myself. At Mom.
    Terror. Of being lost forever.
    Or getting found, and then
    punished. Sent far away
    to live with strangers.
    Shame too.
    How could I be so selfish?
    Searchers who should be focused
    on finding the hunter and his hound
    will have to waste time
    looking for me.
    Or will they? Has anyone
    even noticed
    that I’m gone?
    Sitting still with these thoughts
    becomes impossible, so I lurch
    to my feet, and stumble back
    the way I came. Or at least I hope
    it’s the way. Panic makes the world
    shaky. Things seen from a distance
    change shape as I move closer—
    a loping coyote turns out to be
    a motionless slab of granite.
    That soaring pterodactyl
    is just a crow.
    Tall
    skinny
    ancient
    people
    wearing
    flowing
    robes
    are
    only
    brown
    tree
    trunks.
    I race, then trudge, knowing I can’t
    even trust my own eyesight …
    but at least the night is over.
    Daytime strikes like lightning.
    I’ve been lost for hours and hours.…
    I run, walk, run again
    until I’m so exhausted
    that all I can do
    is stop and rest,
    wish, hope, pray,
    and think of Gabe’s
    smart nose
    warm fur
    happy grin
    loyalty
    courage.
    But the weather is turning.
    Blue sky goes cloudy.
    A cold wind shrieks
    like the spirits
    in one of Tío’s spooky
    campfire stories.
    I close my eyes, hoping that when
    I open them, I’ll discover that I’ve been
    dreaming.
    Is that musky scent
    a bear’s?
    Am I touching
    fur?
    When I open my eyes, instead of dreams,
    I discover a reddish dog who whines
    as he greets me, nuzzles my arm,
    and shows me his trusting eyes,
    filled with joy and hope, because now
    that he’s found a human, he assumes
    everything will be fine.
    It’s not Gabe or another SAR dog,
    so it must be the hunter’s hound.
    He’s lean and bony.
    How long has he been out here?
    Two days? Three? I’ve lost
    track of time. I’m hungry,
    so the poor dog must be
    starving.
    I can’t believe that while I was
    searching for him, he’s the one
    who ended up finding me.
    I feel like a cave boy.
    This is how it must have been.
    Tío has told me about coevolution,
    like when hummingbird beaks
    gradually changed shape, just to fit
    certain flowers. Dogs and man
    learned to need each other
    thousands of years ago.
    No wonder I suddenly feel
    like I’m home,
    even though I’m still
    out in the woods,
    lost and cold.
    Scared.
    The hound is weak, but he talks
    to me in his dog-language
    of movement and touch.
    B.B. has told me that wild animals
    don’t make eye contact, because
    they don’t need to understand
    human faces, but dogs do need
    to know us. They