“Amphora Delectavit” by William Foster, XI: ceramics

“Amphora Delectavit” by William Foster, XI: ceramics

Staylerry Aura

Staylerry: a sad, old farm with poor, symbolic dead animals and a strange, truthful mood because we mostly slaughtered poor animals there.

And on each slaughter day, we all had a chore—for example, my friend Bill’s and mine was shoveling and sweeping poop and mud out of the red trailers that transported the poor animals to the slaughterhouse.

It was filled with poop and dirt, and like everything, it started out fine as we shoveled and swept and said funny things about the bloody slaughter—mostly for comfort. Then ten minutes passed and the talk died down as everything got sweaty and dusty and we got angry.

After twenty minutes, our eyes and spit turned brown.

After four hours, the dust was still there—it was always there—like a ghost.

And if Staylerry is the world—as you’ll see it is—then I’m that trailer—always dirty and talking to dustghosts while poor Mom and Dad and my therapists try to scrub me up to seem nice and shiny to the government inspectors.

I have a feeling you’re not too different, dear reader.

To get to the point, a funky feeling loomed over that farm with its animals and killing houses; a weird spirit or a Santa Claus or something like that.

Of course, it’s hard to put into words. But there was just something about the farm that struck me as a rare, pure form of truth.

It’s the morning of a big turkey slaughter. It’s still dark.

And as I skid-left-turn into the Staylerry dirt road entrance and pass the pigs, I’m still tired. And, like every day, the poor fat pigs still look omniscient and sad behind that old mesh-fence next to the driveway.

They have no purpose but to be killed and chowed.

They know this sad future—you can tell by looking at their sad pink eyes and hunched posture and even watching them live; the pigs always find ways to escape or break things, and they cause nothing but problems for Boss.

To me, they’re the people down at the mental Clinic; the ones who know about real life and all the mechanisms and what truly happens in the world and get sent into isolation as a result.

A brown dust cloud puffs behind me.

I pass the cows.

They’re sitting around the Mom Cow, crying. I always think the cows weep when you look at them; Weeping Cows, I call them. They’re the sweeties of the world, the ones lazing around and looking towards the sky—remind me of my Uncle Quigley or Harry or Cousin Fred because they’re not too crazy to be sent to the far-field, but crazy enough to be normal.

And as I pull into the muddy parking lot and put her in park—and on my way to the slaughterhouse— I pass a few of the pretty little piglets who dash around Staylerry going OINK! and scurrying off when you get too close.

They’re not raised in captivity because Boss has hypothesized that if they get free-roam of the farm, they’ll not even want to escape.

But they need base-camps, and that’s these big old cages situated right next to the slaughterhouse, where they suck on Mama Pig for milk and sleep and do whatever young pigs do.

Feeling melancholy, I pass these cages next—melancholy because the strange feeling looms over these poor piglets the strongest—they don’t understand that they’re food. There’s no thought of the fact that they exist for food! Yet, when they say bye to Mama Pig and go over to that far-field I passed, that’s when then they’ll know—they’ll realize they could have escaped.

They’re my younger self, you know, who grew up just to become a big-old-sad fat pig in the far-field isolation.

You and I live on Staylerry, dear reader.

Now I pass that horrific-smelling crimson turkey trailer backed right up to the slaughterhouse doors. The turkeys hear me and squawk!, clanging the metal—bong!—because they’re not ready to be killed—my least favorite animal, too, because they’re not honest like cows and not cute like baby piglets nor smart like big pigs.

Turkeys are just these stupid selfish birds with pink long necks and little brains—the money guys of the farm because no matter what each turkey does to save itself, it’ll always gets its throat slit and blood drained.

Peeking my head in to see how much work we have, I go:

“Ahren. How many are in here?” to one of the farmers sharpening his knife.

“I don’t know,” Ahren said, “Hundred. Maybe,” he laughed, “There’s four though, Jack.”

A word about Bill slaughtering is necessary, for some reason.

The kid with black hair was always so vindictive when killing turkeys.

He wouldn’t say a word.

He would simply do his slaughterhouse task with a wild look in his eye.

Like when a turkey escaped from the trailer—it had run right between my legs—Bill dropped everything to sprint after it.

When he returned, he carried the maimed bird by its bloody, broken neck.

“This bird,” he said—smiling—to everyone that would listen, “Is dead.”

He threw it into the turkey bucket.

We killed on.