This Is Classified

CLASSI

He was a secret

Black with pleading eyes
and a sniffling nose
he had to be hidden

Classified they called him
and it stuck
even as she saw him for the first time
and wept tears of remembering
'But,
he's so like Sammie'
she had said smiling and crying
'It's my Sammie'

Funny how she could remember the name of her first dog
but not that of her first born son
but he didn't mind
not any more
For now his only worry was how to get
Classi in and out
without the others seeing.
No pets they had said
NO PETS.

He didn't care though
not really
to see her smile
to see her eyes shine
and the dogs tail wag
was all that mattered.

His wife squeezed his hand later in the car
as Classi slept
in the back
worn out by all the fuss.

And his mother slept
in the home
with a tennis ball under her pillow
and the faintest of grins on her ninety three year old
paper thin face.