Vegetables

Vegetables

“just because they can’t say anything
doesn’t mean they don’t hear you coming”;
tomatoes in particular feel pain
thin girlish skin and
seeds quaking in jelly at the first prick
and carrots, shrieking silent
like St. Bartholomew as you peel them
from foot to head: they feel,

they feel. Disemboweled peas

slide into tunbrils, dizzy
with air, beets bleed on the
sinkboard, celery wilts with its heart
in our hands, squash
turns pale on our tables
and when you pick up the knife
and walk across the kitchen, shoeheels softly drumming
even the coarse hydra-headed potato hears you humming

Peter Meinke

//The Magic Eight-Ball says, "The situation is more complicated than you suppose."