COWS NEVER SMILE
				    
        I   
Slowly slogging across a faintly furrowed weed field,   
stopping here   
and there to belch, to chew, to moo,   
hauling two sagging sides of beef,   
she raises her head   
  
and still can't see the clouds   
or the pale, bleached stain   
that will be a full moon tonight.   
  
Above the blue, a smoky shell of ozone cracks,   
the thing within incubating itself,   
hatching preternaturally.   
         
        II   
The bovine, our pastoral villain,   
doesn't pause in her too-casual chewing,   
as her head swings right   
  
then left.   
No one sighted,   
she belches.  Belches again,   
stifles a cud-gurgling chuckle, belches again.   
  
        III   
Patiently,   
she hauls her body near the road,   
looks sufficiently bored   
for those who drive by   
shouting, "Mooooooooooooooooo!"   
  
        IV   
Cows drift unmathematically;   
the field moves them   
like water moves the wet, white teeth   
of dandelions.  The tide carries the cows   
from the barn at Sunrise,   
then lazily pulls them home at dusk.   
  
        V   
Some see wisdom in her stoicism.   
They long for the peace of wandering   
lonely as a cow,   
grunting now and then   
to the slow clop of a cow bell,   
staring cow-eyed   
at a green and gold, edible cow-world.   
They don't see the destruction.   
  
        VI   
They gurgle, belch, and fart in innocence   
convincingly cherubic.   
So cute.  So cute,   
but where do those gasses go?   
Not like pollen, reclining on a breeze,   
rushing to impregnate honeymooning tulips.  No,   
  
they hitch-hike on Heaven-spinning souls,   
going up   
and up, but only so far   
until, dizzy,   
they fall off   
and graze on sky.   
  
        VII   
Somewhere in Wisconsin,   
a calf belches, tasting the alfalfa   
for the third or fourth time.   
She unconsciously grins   
  
until her mother sternly licks the smile away   
before someone sees.