Night sets,
The sun falls.
Moon and stars become uncovered.
A pink faced child crawls under the covers.
A cardboard book is clutched in soft bands.
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looks innocent and careless.
Mother hen, baby calf, wiggly pig,
their  smiling faces send the child off to sleep.

That child remembers that story.
They remember the smiling faces of
mother hen, baby calf, wiggly pig.

That child is no long a child,
they no longer read that cardboard farm book.
They remember their childhood with that book,
they blur into one.
They see a barn just like the  
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just like the picture in the cardboard farm book.

They stop to revisit their childhood,
they stop to revisit their innocence,
they stop to revisit those smiling faces.


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is only a step away,
that no longer child pushes open the sun warmed door.
They except innocence,
they except those smiling faces,
but they did not see what they expected.

The innocence of their childhood was a lie,
there are no smiling faces here.

This is not the
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from their cardboard book,
from their childhood,
they blurred into one.

Mother hen is not smiling,
her beak is cut off with a hot blade, she cannot move her wings in her cage,
her daughters are taken to live her fate,
her sons are ground alive to be feed to her,
mother hen is not smiling.

Baby calf is not smiling,
baby calf is just born,
then taken by a man in blood soaked boots,
baby calf watches helpless as their mother cries,
as their mother chews the metal bars,
as their mother fights the electric shocks.
Baby calf does not know their father,
neither does their mother.
Baby calf is put in a metal cage,
they will live a year or two,
baby calf will not move,
that is the point of veal.
Baby calf is not smiling.

Wiggly pig is not smiling,
wiggly pig can only wiggle,
only enough so her babies can drink her milk,
she cannot reach them though.
Wiggly pig will watch her babies grow,
but beyond what is natural,
beyond what their hearts can handle,
but there is a big demand for bacon.
Wiggly pig can see her babies hung from their hooves,
and slit open alive,
but wiggly pig can only wiggle.
Wiggly pig is not smiling.

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is not as innocent as the cardboard farm book.
That farm in the book,
it was a lie,
but that cardboard farm book was their childhood right?
They blur into one.
Their childhood was a lie.

That no longer child lived a lie,
because power wanted them to only see the smiling faces,
they wanted them to believe that farm in the book
to be true,
not the lie that really is.
Power took away their innocence of childhood.
Power took away babies from their mothers.
Power took away my smile.
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from my child no longer sends me off to sleep.
Instead it keeps me awake with the image of a farm,
not the farm in the cardboard book though,
a farm not filled with smiling animals,
a farm filled with cries, blood, sorrow, pain, horror, death.
A farm that is a lie.

I stand up for animals.
I stand up for them because someone has to be the voice they don’t have.
I stand up for animals because I cannot ignore that fact that they suffer at the hands of humans.
I stand up because I will not take the life out of a creature that has more love than the humans who killed it,
Just for the hunger in my stomach.
I stand up because there is another way to stop that hunger in my stomach.
I stand up for animals because that steak on your plate,
That piece of flesh had a face, and a heart, and a mind, and a soul.
That piece of “meat” was a baby.
That baby was taken away from their mother as soon as they were born.
That mother cried, and that mother fought against the metal bars she was trapped within.
That mother broke out all of her teeth chewing on those metal bars to try to save her baby.
That mother would never bring a baby into her world because she knows their fate,
She has to see that fate every time she has a baby, but she has no control.
She does not know the face of her baby’s father,
She never met him.
I stand up because that mother’s cries cannot be heard by the ignorant man in the boots.
I stand up because my voice might just be heard.
It might, if I yell loud enough.
If I fight hard enough,
For that mother and her baby,
I stand up.