By Milton T. Milton

‘How gappy’ thought dog recoiling from a smart meeting with another China King Charles spaniel. Through moist slits he verified the identity of the wretched, young Carradock standing soiled and smug and smelling of banana. Closing weary eyes and resigned to the ground, a blurry yet distinct after image was emblazoned continuously upon the central locus of temporary focus, ‘why so dog?’

Without the necessary conceptual resources to pick apart the content of this most baffling self-attribution, dog began to pine. Pine for his inadequacy in resolving the perplexing puzzle presented. Yet in despair dog crystallized the spring of evasive volition he held to.

Realising that his pining had ceased, dog asserted that he most probably was not pining for anything, not for any object. Directionless and projecting a sore cave, permeations of light broke through the gaps created by the erosion of a construct that really was a gappy affair.

With ‘these nuggets aren’t bunkum’ embedded within a pixilated reflection, dog arose with a significant sense of wavering unbounded upon a tidal surge of inner activity. It soon became clear that Carradock never misses, as this pensive dog sat, tail wagging, looking slightly demented and routinely cornered. Indelible grooves formed along a back whose prominent spine felt that effortless impact of another China King Charles Spaniel, an old wound opened.

Carradock atypically hovered for a second longer than last, the image of a hapless yapper engulfed in contingent futility registering without any pragmatic flaws. The China King Charles Spaniel landed intact upon the same piece of ground that dog now hit, lying blank and feckless, static upon an arid shore with the emboldened after image ‘why so dog?’