A Cruelty Too Far, by Wendy Ward

May Safely Graze contributor Wendy Ward has written about cruel practices in the dairy industry.  “The dairy cow is a milking machine. Her maternal instincts are crushed by the yearly removal of her hard-born calf.”

In this short poem she recounts seeing a cow in a field struggling to give birth, and seeing a truckload of calves arrive at a slaughterhouse.  

 

Being a mother myself, a long time ago I stopped to watch a cow give birth

I found myself bearing down with her as she fought and struggled to deliver her calf.

I never found out the fate of the calf but I know what happens to bobbies – a sweet name for a waste product.

Like I’d called my child Pooh!

Once I saw a truckload of these babies arrive at a slaughterhouse. 

Poured down chutes into yards,

the tiny bundles of new life, crying with hunger,

surged towards me.

Have I got milk?

No! You are the mother lode of the white gold.  Be content!

Every fibre of my being is strung out, taut with despair at the very thought of it.

Nature has primed for birth and afterwards, the separation of mother and calf, the killing of healthy newborns. is a cruelty too far.

 

Warning bells are chiming.

We cannot hear.

Our ears are blocked.

They need flushing out.

Like waste products.