"It is an interstitial creature, neither person nor beast, forever oscillating uncomfortably between the roles of high-status
animal and low-status person. As a consequence, the dog is rarely accepted and appreciated purely for what it is… Instead, 
it has become a creature of metaphor, simultaneously embodying or representing a strange mixture of admirable and despicable traits. 
…Elsewhere, the dog’s ambiguous or intermediate status has endowed it with supernatural powers, and the ability to travel as a 
spiritual messenger or psychopomp between this world and the next.”
(Serpell, 1995)

...

"Contempt of the world, contempt of thyself: rejoice in thy own contempt, but despise no other person." (1386)
"They who love no longer have the virtues to do anything but wander in the storms of love." (≈1200)
Wie die Tiere den Jäger begraben (how the animals bury the hunter.) (1850)

Death is a loyal companion.

...

Naught but dust in an unmarked grave, and yet (I pray) in some distant sense still frolicking 
in some echo of that very same autumn afternoon when your tiny hand first met mine. Already gone 
from me, but at times I can almost hear faint laughter and the chiming churchbells you always 
loved so much. 

I can only hope there's flowers at the end of everything, too.
.
.
.