Restaurant Reviews - The Inver

3 Dogs & a raven

 It was the crow I saw first; flew right over my head,

my grandmother's messenger.

It landed on the fence post and looked back at me.

I walked on.

The deerhound was next, in Dunlop.

"Is that one of Nell's deerhounds?" I said.

"You know Nell?" The man looked at me in amazement.

"Yes, my last dog, Torquil was from Nell. I couldn't get another after he died."

"Her mother was one of Nell's," he commented.

The dog put her nose into my hand, and then rested her nose in my neck, just like my boy.

She whined after me when I walked away.

A beagle was next, like Chaucer, my first dog. With me through all the pain of my 20s.

It ran away from its owner and came to rubbing its shoulders against my leg.

I looked down. Stroked its back, calmly held its chest.

What a support she was for me; what a good dog, 

...'right to the end.' Like the song.

"Sorry, I don't know what got into her," a middle-aged woman walking along the beach said.

She dragged her away; the dog glanced back.

Next was the lab. Black. Like Macbeth.

Sat still. Watched each step. My eyes. 

An honour guard, of old memories.

dear ones.