The Long View Poem by Jan Oskar Hansen

the long view

We, humans, live to kill; we murder something every day
Take breakfast.
we eat birds' embryos by the millions
And eat the milk the calf should have for a healthy life
And the mother ends up in a hamburger
Potatoes scream in pain when peeled and cooked in fat
Carrots pulled up by its root are in agony
The same goes for sweet tomatoes that bleed white blood
When cut in half for your salad.
We poison insects over farmland, a fog of poisonous gasses
To make tired soil produce more.
Even the beloved pet, the dog, is not spared; we shower them with misplaced love, doing, make them cling and behave unnaturally.
We ignore the obvious, all life is capable of pain; what are
For us to do is to eat ourselves cooked or fried.