(Today's poem was inspired by a prompt to write about shelters.)
The therapy horse whinnies as we approach
the no-kill shelter
on Russell Road.
There, cats that are HIV-positive and afflicted
with feline leukemia live alongside a crowing rooster,
a bull, and a couple of goats.
Stardust presides quiet-faced in her field
as people walk past
her peaceable kingdom.
There, she shares space with dogs
who may have been abused or mistreated co-mingle with hens
and volunteers who are short of all resources but love.
White-maned and graying at the sides,
she is thirty-nine,
a horse with a spirit.
There, she walks a public road
unattended, with poise and no fear through her home
that accepts all creatures, no questions asked.
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