This selection, chosen by guest editor nat raum, is from Dogwitch by Catherine Rockwood (Bottlecap Press, 2025).
A Tinderbox Itself Is Innocent
Last night my husband dreamed
a long fenced-in yard.
At the other end of it a dog
lifted its head to look at him.
The dog got up.
“A she-dog,” he said.
Once she unfolded he could see
how much taller she was than the fence.
In fact, the juxtaposition of fence and dog
had been misleading.
Nothing causal.
She’d just decided to lie down.
The dog fixed eyes as big as pot-lids on my husband.
At this point I should tell you, we had a dog once
who nearly caused us to self-destruct with anxiety.
Six months old
half bloodhound, half coonhound.
Taken from her litter early
and mistreated.
Several people thought they might use her for hunting
but one by one gave up
because why the fuck would she let them do that
all things fucking considered.
By the time she came to us
she was a lighted fuse.
About a month later she bit for the first time
soon after that
we thought she might never stop.
I loved her.
Why would you love her?
I loved her.
Not to where I thought we could keep her.
Some people meet me and back away stiff-legged
senses thrumming.
But I’m not that girl anymore
or never was.
I released my hopeless love
into more capable hands.
Got a tattoo
of a lanky hound-bitch
digging up bones
that burst into leaf
when she pulls them from dirt.
And for now, if my husband dreams
of an enormous dog
she steps over fences
puts her head down
waits patiently for his touch.
Catherine Rockwood (she/they) lives near Boston. She reads and edits for Reckoning Magazine. Two of Catherine’s poetry chapbooks, Endeavors To Obtain Perpetual Motion and And We Are Far From Shore: Poems for Our Flag Means Death, are available from The Ethel Zine Press. Their third chapbook, Dogwitch, is available from Bottlecap Press. They are wrangling a long full-length poetry manuscript — or perhaps two shorter manuscripts — who knows? Up with mystery!
nat raum (b. 1996) is a queer disabled artist, writer, and editor based on unceded Piscataway and Susquehannock land in Baltimore. They hold an MFA from the University of Baltimore and a BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art. Past and upcoming publishers of their work include Poet Lore, beestung, Baltimore Beat, Split Lip Magazine, BRUISER, and others. Find them online at natraum.com.
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