you don't read Steinbeck

you don't read Steinbeck
when you have lived Steinbeck
you don't inhale a Red Pony
grasping for breath when you have
cupped an apron full of blood and buried
it in dust, the

Grapes of Wrath are still grapes, unlike
the dried up tits of a holstein
pulled raw and cracked as the calloused
fingers of a hungry child

i often shunned required reading like
the shunning received by town girls with
velvet ribbons in their hair, or from 
boys who all had a unique name for dirt; one
prefers reading instead about places
unseen, like a clean bed with feathered white pillows, like
the touch of soft hand or the music
of a contented mother's lullaby; reality is

cattle die too often in birthing, reality is a sow that
leaves a trail of swollen lifeless piglets behind
in removal from her deathbed.  winters were harsh, brutality in a
lesson of understanding that there is a surrender of cells
when all movement comes still, til thaw
pulls them again into an opening
of un-fertile field,

any reader
that sojourners down gravel knows
first hand shoes without sole, knows pebbles caught
and carried for years
beyond miles left,  it was then i had a knowing of all
saints by name and date
of consecration (martyred many as an
early morning cock to be served
up with soured  
butter over feed corn)

yet, i finally meant
up with Steinbeck's Cannery Row and a
coastline west of the Mississippi,  as Steinbeck
never really leaves one (gut or gutless)

whether you have read its pain
or just lived it

bkmackenzie
copyrighted 2011

Posted of One Shot Wednesday at One Stop Poetry

Photo: John Steinbeck