Wild Sovereign Development Site

Tag: meat

  • salami baby jesus

    I may or may not have been down to the markets today to visit the man who runs a wonderful salami stall; he offers salamii (that’s the plural) of goose, duck, venison, and pig. This man has taught me that the original salami were loaf-shaped, like baby cheeses, and the familiar linked sausage format is an innovation. What’s for certain is that I bought from him a plump, nipple-ended salami powdered in white rice flour which he says is called ‘the little baby Jesus.’

    He cradled it in both hands and rocked it a little, to show me. I had on my Dad’s pyjamas under my jeans and was only waiting to get home to get really, truly comfortable.

    After that I may or may not have suggested to him, Hey! You should make a nativity scene on your stall every year – and have The Little Baby Jesus as your Jesus.

    I would, the man said. He was rueful. I would love to. It’s just that – some people might get offended.

    I was crooning over my plump swaddled baby, sniffing its pungent head. “Offended?”

  • meat time

    I love how the cat comes and sits, not next to the fridge, just sort of within range… letting me know with infinite courtesy that, you know, no hurry or anything, but some people might say it’s high time for Meat Time. “Meat Time!” I say, finally noticing her where she folds like a furred god, immaculately footed. Her tail is wrapped around her legs, she is not getting in anybody else’s way, she doesn’t say a word – and not only because she has no words and little use for words, it’s because she is being polite. If I walk between her and the magic fridge, where, for all I know she knows, the meat actually grows, ready carved into fresh nibble-sized bleeding chunks, she almost falls over herself skipping to reach me – she does a little hop, like a twist, her backside and haunches still sitting on the ground while her eager front feet have set off in the opposite direction. She reminds me of comics in old movies who say, “They went… thaddaway!” pointing two fingers in two directions. I let the chunks of flesh fall into her bowl. I’ve given up moving the old hair elastic that is her beloved and her prey, which every day ends up dropped into her empty dish. I hadn’t given up wondering why she would drag it over there once she’s done chasing and torturing the poor thing, then one day it dawned on me: oh. This is her eating place, where she would drag the corpse of her intended supper if she weren’t a soft little domestic possum-murderer. That worn elastic is her prey.