Hog Butcher for the World…    
                                                             City of Big Shoulders
                                                                             Carl Sandburg, 1916

Trucks upon trucks, construction
delay us on 65 to Chicago
(I’m flying next year – can’t take this)

Stopped again – this time alongside a huge
steel trailer with slats all
up and down the sides.  I notice
flesh pink and bulging
from the openings – slats
for air.  I look and see blushing
peach mounds covering the massive
bed, lying down nestled,
sleeping.  Crowded, their bristles thrust
through the holes.

Sleeping.
No rooting, no wallowing, silent.  Suckled
by sows.  This king-sized steel sty – their
last home.

If they were in a cartoon, I fantasize,
or if one were
Old Major, possibly they could escape.

We are headed to Chicago though.

We stop at a diner.  It is inevitable.

Bacon burned, I order.
Two eggs over easy.