Home >> Volume 6, Issue 01

Translation of an Ascetic

Kathleen Kilcup

To refuse meat, we
must think of the one
with no meat, and again
of the ones made
of meat only. To refuse,
is a bowing
down, a tucking of will,
a turning of the sail to the wind,
if the meat is rancid.
 
To refuse meat makes
us bloodless ghosts
            —of what kind?
Hungry, we bend over
any bowl. Refuse
the corner trap—
two walls, one right.
 
Eat meat.
Eat hunger.