National Poetry Month: First Poem

For National Poetry Month I am accepting the challenge from this site to write a poem every day.  I won't publish all of them ( some of them of pretty terrible) but I thought I put some of them here.

Today's prompt: write a poem that is based on a secret shame, or a secret pleasure. 

How was I to know?

How was I to know that you,

A scruffy mutt of a dog,

Small, shaggy, amiable—

You who readily jumped into our car

And came home with us

On that day we found you alone—

How was I to know

As I stood in my front yard

Watching the neighbor boy

Pedal by on his bike

That you knew

What “Sic ‘em” meant?

That you would chase down that boy

That you would bite that boy on the leg

That you would be so quick to obey and defend

I don’t know what possessed me to say those words

And I certainly never owned my part in your transgression

Till years had passed

And fear of punishment

And just plain embarrassment

Had faded away.