Poetry

On Rumination

Take an idea, grind it down to its tiniest fragments.
Take your cow teeth and masticate on the key to world peace,
Your reason for living,
The origins of the universe.
Whichever nutritious thorn, or wide-crowned branch that formerly sentineled as a
windbreak for a finch’s nest;
Took a turn as a backseat (and stepping-stair) for an adventurous child.
Reduce the plant to cellulose and green bile, awsim in stomach slime.
Dissolve the idea into a porridge, and wait.

How wide the eye of a simple cow might grow if it were to feel the leaf-bits
recompose on its heavy tongue;
the stems connect, the wood rebark;
chloroplasts regenerate multiple time:
Maple shoot at midmorning, poplar crown at noon, simple grass at suppertime.

The mystical art of rumination comes naturally to the idle mind,
rest from mental unrest coming only when even the deconstituted bits of thought
reform into sweeter and sweeter wholes.

Only then can we swallow the thought in its final form without choking.

Vanessa Okoyeh

Vanessa Okoyeh is a 22-year-old Nigerian-American who studies law. She spends her free time writing, erasing, and rewriting poetry, stand-up shots, and songs.

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