Brandy

Black and tan, contentious colours,
your panting flanks and eager eye.
A questing snout quivers to defend;
loyalty is your nature, not a means to an end.

Drunk, I named you for a drink,
But Fido, that tired  joke, is your ideal:
faithful, trustworthy,
except, perhaps, around a meal.

Your greed was your doom, or martyrdom.
To poison the bowl of a fellow-creature
eager to live, to take breath,
and eager too, for your faithless caress.

Three-year-old male German shepherd dog, poisoned after his owner was shot by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Belfast.