Starving and Full
By Kate Dunayer
An Animal Rights Poem from All-Creatures.org

This everything that I am
waits like an anticipation
upon the threshold
of its next moment
Both empty and pregnant
starving and full
the future becomes present
and I am here to greet it
Holding on and letting go
the universe parts, time moves
an environment surrounds me
I touch it
Something unheard of
covers my face, backlights my wishes
tosses my self to the wolves to be tested
I choose love
Fear runs like hell in the opposite direction
a broken bottle in its hand
screaming for attention
sick and dying from its own infection
Memories of hate recall the student vivisector
counting down from eight
like an eight-year-old boy playing spaceship, smoking a cigarette,
preparing the monkey's skull and body for trauma,
pressing the button, making the noise for takeoff
as the half-dead live animal's head is bashed again
by a machine specially designed to simulate
a windshield, the pavement, a wall, hit full force
by a skull.
The monkey survives
again ...
this is the third time
...not the last time...
tears pour from buckets in my head
I moan and groan on the bed, cover my mouth
hold my pants, force myself to watch
the student vivisector smoke a cigarette
pose and smile for the camera with the flailing
damaged animal he has named "Dopey."
I could kill that man this moment.
When I was born I knew this would happen.
At this moment I know everything.
And this everything that I know is me
waiting like an anticipation
upon the threshold
of my next moment
Both empty and pregnant
starving and full.

Originally published on The Animals Voice