My Gundnie | Katherine Goodell

I crawled into bed. I was ten.
Reached under my blankets
and he was not there.
I groped in the dark, feeling
quilt, carpet, dust under the bed.
Static shock glinted deep underneath
the sheets.
I left Gundnie on the bus, from the trip,
on the hot sterilized sweat bus miles
away in the sunny west. Call search and
rescue, call bus office! Such luck, they mailed
my Gundnie to me. His thin neck, beady
eyes and his worn white fur stuffed in a box.
Gundnie now was safe with me. How he
still fears being stuffed in a dark scarce box.