We're Not Farmers by Diana Park

We're Not Farmers

by Diana Park

We've been starving for so long. Our voices echo

in our bellies, our throats vibrate.

We've milked the cow, then sold it.

One by one you behead the chickens. I put them in soup

so the food will last.

What's left are a few hens and one cock. You take the eggs away.

To forget, we sleep. Putting on pajamas and crawling into bed

feels like another chore. You grind your teeth in your sleep,

and I can't.

I dream we're down to one hen--who can't lay eggs.

She's my friend. You will not spare her, have your needs too.

I cook

but don't eat. While you suck the flesh from each wing,

a noise erupts from your mouth. The hen inside you is clucking her tongue.

As your stomach swells, she squawks louder, louder

until she breaks through.

You dream of rain every night. Our field's barren.

I'm not sorry.

This poem was originally published in Tin House in the Summer 2006 issue.

Part of what I enjoy about this poem is that I wrote a similarly-themed poem, Farm Life, which you can read on this site. My poem is also strange and dark and bleak, so I immediately felt a kinship to this piece. (I feel very attached to Farm Life. I wrote it in the 1980s and it was not published for a looooooooong time.)

Anyway, is this a poem about a naive couple who thinks they can become farmers? Is this a poem about a relationship between two people who are not right for each other?

My answer is yes. Sure.

First, these people should not be farming--getting rid of the animals that you can get milk and eggs from, so you stop starving, is not smart.

Next, the poem's second section sure seems to me that things are not going well with this couple. His needs kill and cook her friend. Yes, it's a dream, but it's a dream in a poem, so it is important. The hen then erupts from the partner's body. He, meanwhile, dreams of rain, but it does not create any. And she is not sorry.

Is this a metaphor for not having children--he wants them and she does not (at least with him)? Going to bed, we are told in the first section, feels like a chore. Hmmmm . . .

I like the weirdness of this poem, no matter what it means or does not mean. It has stuck with me since I first read it in my copy of Tin House 20 years ago. This journal is no more, unfortuantely--I always enjoyed it. Diana Park is on Instagram and LinkedIn, and you can learn more about her here and here.