Yes I’ve read E.B. White
and P.G. Wodehouse
and “Animal Farm” as well,
and seen both ‘Babe” movies,
the affirming first,
the dark second.
And I never fail
to visit the barnyard
at the local zoo
and admire their two porkers
doing absolutely nothing.
I
‘ve even seen a documentary
on pigs in rural Spain
rooting out truffles.
Pigs are pigs.
Nothing else is
Not even your brother
who’ll eat anything
or the girl down the block
who’ll do whatever guys ask.
They’ve been occupying
their own selves
long before the lazy metaphors got here.
I saw a pregnant sow in Vermont
who could barely lift herself off her straw.
There was nothing human in those
rolls of pinkish gray flesh.
Loveable was strictly in her own eyes.
She grunted at the sight of me.
And that was without benefit
of any books and movies
on the human condition.
I didn’t grunt back.
I had no right to.
