Poem 15/30- Dogs Teach Us Many Lessons

Tonight when I was trying to find the article about lung cancer,
I found a whole different article about using dogs to detect stomach cancer. 

April is National Poetry Month. This year, I've chosen "Dog Days" as my theme. Every day, for these thirty days, I will write a poem about dogs. Today's poem is a found poem. This morning, on the way to work, I heard about a study, where dogs were able to detect lung cancer with 97% accuracy.  Tonight, when I was trying to write a poem, I hunted down the article and made it into a found poem. 

"dogs teach us many lessons"

dogs teach us many lessons

highly evolved 

sense of smell 

can identify cancer 

in blood samples 

with 97 percent accuracy

it is possible

that researchers will determine 

the biologic compounds

dogs detect

then design

cancer-screening tests

based on those compounds

dogs teach us many lessons

dogs

provide us 

with unconditional love 

and support, 

remind us to be grateful 

and present,

 and keep us walking 

and healthy 

well into our golden years

dogs teach us many lessons

(C) Carol Wilcox, 2019