Poem Beginning With A Line From Herberto Helder

Someone opens an orange in silence

but in the graceful folding back of skin is violence.

So says the little man who teaches the philosophy

of eating flesh in the school downtown. We are not free

he murmurs, to tear a stem from its roots

a seed from its fruit.

And if we do it anyhow,

choosing to kill the living plant over the living cow,

it’s nothing to be proud of. No, he suffers, murderous and cold.

But we are seventeen years old

and his mustache is funny.

The day is exploding, green and wild and sunny,

it’s noon and we are very hungry.