I Will Sprout A Vegan Today Poem by Lila Marquez

I will sprout a vegan today,
tomorrow, and days ahead;
I will sprout a vegan again
while I, only yesterday
but an island, a desert,
a whisper in the woods
from gentle howls
to stifled pleas
amid dairy machines
and death banquets.

I will sprout a vegan
which petals shall withstand
the grit of greed
and wretched words,
for this complex seed
photosynthesizing
ambition is bound
from-north-to-south-
to-west-to-east.

I will sprout
days with the kind
of kindness unspoken
for others, the otherness
that tread on four feet,
while a vegan in
each one of us
hidden, caged, finally
rousing from the cries
of someone sentient
breaking free.

I will sprout a vegan today
I will sprout veganism
I will sprout
I will
We.

(from 'Line Breaker: A Collection of Poems', Lila Marquez,2021)