There is flesh grown in a petri dish
that pretends to be alive
sometimes pretends to be
human
and we listen as the meat talks
about the marble in its thigh,
provenance, all the grass it hasn’t eaten,
how for years it was suckled
and called a different name. 

When it arrives at the table
it’ll be wearing a muscle shirt,
boots with work socks — maybe
nothing else. No one has given it
a fatal flaw, taught it how to dress. 

Its eyes are separated by a ridge
of fur, it believes the world is dewy
half-life, a transaction
made with each waxy gaze.