The Rainbow Bridge: A Poem ❤️ 🐶

When We Come (Extended Version)

At the edge of a bright, quiet field,
our dogs wait — tails circling light like small suns.
They know the rhythm of our footsteps on gravel,
the pause before our laughter,
the sigh between our words.

They nap in patches of gold,
where clover hums with bees and time has no teeth.
Sometimes a shadow drifts across their dreams —
a ball thrown long ago,
a whistle carried by wind.

There is a river, clear as a bowl of sky-water,
and a bridge painted with all the storms and suns.
They cross it and return,
as if to test its color,
as if to make sure it’s still there
for the day we arrive.

They are never in a hurry,
for they have learned the shape of forever.
Old hips don’t ache. Gray faces don’t fade.
They chase the light, tumble, roll,
then sprawl like warm rugs in summer grass.

Sometimes, when the wind smells like home,
every ear lifts, every heart beats faster —
but it is only the echo of our missing.
So they rest again,
guarding the space beside them,
just our size,
just enough for two hands and a heartbeat.

They keep our secrets like buried bones —
where we cried, where we hoped,
the things we said only to them.
They have made a quiet kingdom of waiting,
built from wagging tails and patience.

And when the day comes —
not with thunder,
not with tears,
but with the soft sound of feet
on the far side of the sky —
they will rise, shake the stars from their fur,
and come running, faster than joy.

We’ll meet in the place beyond missing,
where no doors close,
no clocks tick,
and every path leads to play.
We’ll walk on together, slow and easy,
through meadows of endless afternoon.

All the good dogs in the world
trotting ahead, looking back, saying —
come.
And this time,
we do.