My Neighbor's Dalmatian

My neighbor calls her Coppy,
with two p's, but I print C-o-p-y
onto my tablet in careful
first-grader letters.

My spelling of her name make sense
to me because duplicate
black spots like those
on her stomach

are also beginning to emerge
one after another on the blank
pages of her week-old pups,
spots that I can almost read

like answers rising from the belly
of a magic 8-ball or
the scramble of letters
I'm newly learning to decipher.

My neighbor places one of the dappled
pups into my hand, the same hand
that is beginning to line up my world
with the touch of a pencil.

I hold the pup
with its young spinning heart
and ribs of braille, with
its trembling warmth

and spotty code, and I am
breathless and
once again
illiterate.