Dogstar (“going on a dream”) by Andira Dodge

Beneath a dark and twinkly sky, she watched and waited as her breath tried keeping pace with the night wind. It was a quiet battle.

“Can we talk about just one star?” she asked the scholar who had set up a telescope and was busy adjusting settings by torchlight, ready to locate and identify constellations. He paused and looked at her as she stood quietly, looking up into night. “Just one star in such a big sky?” he asked, ready to regale her with dozens of names and hopefully as many stories. 

She only nodded. It was so quiet, still. Just a soft wind through the valley. He looked at his telescope and pile of books, then stepped away from them. He moved to stand by her, joining in looking at the expanse above. “What do you want to talk about?” hoping he’d know enough. 

She pointed and described the larger brighter star near Orion and asked if that was Sirius. He smiled. “Yes. Canis Majoris. Dogstar.  Brightest in our sky. Larger than our Sun.  ‘Powerful and fallen,’ according to Whitman.” 

She watched and felt wind and stars shifting around her, felt him close but not close enough, both their arms hanging by their sides, as empty as the night. “Why is it a ‘dog’ star?” 

He was more than ready to fill the space with facts. She seemed close but so far away. “It’s a main focus of the Canis Major constellation, the Dog,” he began, comfortable with the Known. “The rising of Sirius marked the beginning of summer for ancient Egyptians, and a hot and dry summer would be known as the ‘dog days of summer.’ Animals – and men – would pant and lose control, fading with the heat, while women would thrive and be aroused and, um, rise… Ahh… The word Sirius may also be taken from the Greek for scorching or Egyptian for the god Osiris, the God of the Moon.” 

He had been on a roll and glad to talk about something he knew, he understood. So much about his days were uncertain and difficult. He sometimes lost track with her but she didn’t seem to mind. He just wanted to melt into her, hold her. He wondered how he could maneuver to do just that as she turned to him and asked, “Why did men fade as women rose? What does that mean?”

He hesitated, trying to recall the mythology connecting the stars to the ancients. He told her how they linked dogs panting in summer to the bright star that would herald the season. He recalled to her old beliefs about changing seasons, like summer to autumn made men lose control because the gods were often battling, using men as pawns. Somewhere in his mini-lecture was a mention of soldiers battling both the gods and women feverish with unnatural passions of summer. But he might have been confusing his myths. He was barely listening to himself as he looked at her, the curve of her face, her hair in the starlight. He knew even in the mostly-dark night how her lips would be slightly pursed as she listened to him. 

He remembered one more story about the star. He said, more softly and in less a lecture tone, “It was said Sirius fell in love with a goddess of harvest but he couldn’t have her. He burned hot every summer as harvesttime got close and he remembered his great love… he was the burning star… rising…” and he tapered off, forgetting what else he was going to say as she turned and looked at him. 

They gazed at each other in shadow for several heartbeats. 

She smiled and said, “I always wondered if the Dead were singing about a Dark Star or a Dog Star, but I like the phrasing with the seafaring lost sailor and the ghost wind and broken chains…” She was on the verge of babbling, they both knew. 

It was a sweet and light moment in the dark as they kissed and forgot about mythology. 

‘Compass card is spinning

Helm is swinging and fro

Oh, where is the dog star

Oh, where’s the moon…

You’re a lost sailor

You’ve been too long at sea’

– Lost Sailor, Grateful Dead

Andira is a poet and photographer with a blog at wordrummager.com