wet market
Poem by Erin Vosters
In the wet market men
sluice water across the floor. A heap
of mammals’ hearts are on a table
with the more ordinary organ meats,
only just larger than human hearts.
Purple light from bulbs above gilds
the hearts the vessel red of a liver,
a lung, ridged arterial and venous.
There’s no difference now between
the blood the vessels hold, their oxygen
spent, thin twigs of crimson gone jellied
in the still cold. In passing, I could palm
one, and almost do. Slanting uneven
to the entryway, the concrete floor
runs red with liquid light.
The smell inside is hot dry peppercorns
and star anise; cumin; fresh-killed
fish. Those creatures kept their blood-
stuffed hearts until they were gutted,
and then theirs got washed from the floor.
Whose hearts we choose to keep;
whose to slick away into some gutter.