Flo The Greyhound

She passes the place where I sit some mornings, her slow, sure gait pads a gentle elegance across the grass carrying just a hint of indifference. Retired from racing, she has been adopted out. She seems contained within herself, ignoring the yappy terrier and the playful retriever that bounds towards her on her right, not shifting her gaze as if transfixed on some vision she holds in her head. Nothing of the morning disturbs her meditations. I often wonder whether she is playing out a trauma that has lodged in her memory or can't fit the past and present together into some reconcilable whole or her aloofness is just the nature of the breed and the interpretation of her manner has more to do with me. There is a solitude in her that I cannot fathom and troubles me. Sometimes I feel like bending down and putting my arms around her lovely neck but a reticence holds me back as we both go our separate ways, each with our own solitude held locked within.