Once,
there was a need
that became fastidious.
In bottomless chasms,
the monsters
had eaten each other
since time immemorial.
The eyes
of the octopus
boggled.
The jaguar
waggled its head
in the red warmth of ribs.
Vultures
soared keenly
for corpses.
None of them thought about beauty.
Or justice.
Or suffering.
For millions and millions of years.
But then –
without precedent –
one of them did.
One creature
learnt
to say choices.
And found
that it needed
its daily zones
free of fresh blood.
That it yearned
for structured communities:
where pain was forbidden,
and random events,
and all inappropriate plots.
That it had grown sick
of the ways of the planet –
it wished to gaze at its love,
to shape permanent proofs.
To walk down the street
in a braid of warm meaning,
to watch games where nobody died.
As for the meat it was made of:
flesh was a crime-site,
to its way of thinking.
What did it share, any more,
with hyenas or squid?
It liked to buy things –
to dine with its friends –
to drive out to vineyards and hills.
To sit, by itself,
with the timbre of words.
To tell itself tales of enlargements.
So many pleasures.
And yet:
it was scared –
of the world,
of the things
that it thought.
Imagine,
if you will,
a creature
that began to talk to others, to itself…
EN 
MK