Pigs

There must be something
in the oral tradition
about the first animal
the sun makes visible
on any given day.

*

There is.

*

There must be something
of the policeman
in the gormless features of the ruminants
wherever they remain upon the earth.

*

There is.

*

Tell me

will you roll in this shit forever?
will you eat the parasites from their raw sheaths?
will you soften the hide
in the grease of the hydraulics of the skull?
will you print your own name in the lye?

*

—it may become necessary
as you already know 
to stand in a cold room
for eight to twelve hours
as the requested payments
break and then combine in many branches
like a map of altitudes in layered colors

*

I believe we will remember best
the days of that mean pig in shit
when the audits were simpler
and the cliffs were ours      in 1999


Reprinted with the permisison of the author.