---
title: A Dog Is a Dog
date: "2026-08-31 18:30"
form: poem
---

A Dog is a Dog.
A Cat is a Cat.
A Tree is a Tree.
And a Stone is a Stone.

The trouble begins when we start seeing
someone else in them.

We see our beloved in a dog—
and now its loyalty can make us cry.

We see our partner in a cat—
and suddenly its absence can feel like betrayal.

We see memories in a tree—
and cutting it down feels like losing a part of ourselves.

We see God in a stone—
and suddenly, the stone is no longer just a stone.

Perhaps things themselves never changed.

**Only what we saw in them changed.**

And maybe that is the source of both
our greatest misery
and our greatest devotion.

The world is full of dogs, cats, trees and stones.

But the human mind is never satisfied seeing things as they are.

It keeps turning them into
lovers, enemies, memories, gods, hopes and fears.

And then—

we spend our lives suffering, loving, worshipping and fighting
with what was never really there.