These days, a dog-walker is obliged to clean up anything their animal leaves on the pavement. I wondered how odd it must look to the dog.
We dogs are very puzzled by you humans and your ways.
We take you out for walkies in the neighbourhood most days,
And often change our route so that you get a change of view;
But you seem to be obsessed with bagging up our doggie poo.
Why is it that you humans find our droppings so attractive?
It’s not as though the stuff is horticulturally active.
We try to stop you doing it, by pulling on your lead,
But nothing works. It must be some deep psychological need.
When horses take their humans out, they seem to get away
With leaving piles and piles of poo along the Queen’s highway.
Their humans never tag along with plastic bags and scoops
To commandeer for who-knows-what their steaming horsey poops*.
It really is embarrassing, this manurial attraction,
It has to stop; we dogs must take some managerial action.
Next time we take you out, beware! We’ll take chunks out of you
If you should ever, ever stoop to picking up our poo.
[* An editorial note: That’s true, but gardeners, with their spade,
Will sometimes make a bee-line for where a horse’s dung gets laid.
They do it rather furtively: they’ll wait till no-one’s looking,
Then shove it in their bucket, even though the stuff’s still cooking.]