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Ruth Irupé Sanabria — Carne
00:17:18
Ruth Irupé Sanabria’s delicious and dexterous “Carne” begins with these lines: “I've eaten pork from / pernil to chuletas to chitterlings.” And just in case you were wondering — and even if you’re not — the speaker goes on to list much more of the seafood, poultry, and animal parts that have been consumed and how they were cooked. Lest you think this poem is simply a meat-eater’s manifesto, savor its final turn towards what else the speaker is really hungry for. We invite you to subscribe to Pádraig’s weekly Poetry Unbound Substack, read the Poetry Unbound books and his newest work, Kitchen Hymns, or listen to all our Poetry Unbound episodes.
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My name is Padre Go Toma.
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And for a year I worked as a school chaplain. And during that year, three times, because I wrote it down each time so I remember it three times, young people spoke to me about an experience where they'd felt respected from one of their classmates or somebody at home or somebody in the school. And I don't know why. There was something about when an 11 year old or 12 year old told me that they'd felt respected, that it really struck me because I wondered what's the quality of encounter needed for a young person to feel and to know that they're respected. And none of these young people were speaking about a sense of entitlement that, you know, I demand to be respected. There was a deep sense of quietude in them that gave them pause to reflect on what they wanted as a result of being respected. I've never forgotten that and it has changed my relationship with that word ever since. Carne by Ruth Irupe Sanabrea I've eaten pork from pernil to chuletas to chitterlings. I've dipped my hands in oily paper bags of deep fried gizzards and chicken hearts. I've swallowed raw clams and oysters. I've eaten a stack of jellyfish, cubes of crocodile. I've eaten pigeon and sparrow. I've eaten bad chicken. I've swallowed the shiny, salty, slimy pink and pitch caviar out of tiny Russian tins. I've eaten goat, bulbuls and ox and catfish, swordfish, monkfish and salmon. I've eaten prawns and scooped blood stew and I have eaten red meat, shredded, cubed, ground, boiled, fried, broiled, tough, tender, young and old, pounded, breaded or wrapped in dough, in phyllo, in tortilla, nestled in the mashed potato, platano, cornmeal or cornhusk, tongue in marinade, brain, burger patty and barbecued intestines. I grew up with blood on my bread, el jugito, the cow's little juice reserved for the growing child. The scent of the steak on the skillet drew me to my mother when hungry, periodically I turn. I refuse to take in flesh a meal, a day or even years. I go without. When I first felt the rejection in my nine year old body, my mother bought me a shirt to honor my conscience, pink with happy farm animals drawn in blue. I don't eat my friends written across my young belly. There's a huge amount to be said about the language in this brilliant poem, and I'll get to that later. But first of all, it's the end. I want to think about the turn of the poem, the announced turn of the poem, where she says, periodically I turn. Ruth Rupe Cenabrius starts off this great poem with a kind of a carnal description of a slaughterhouse of beasts and fish and animals of land and sea. And then dramatically, muscularly, I think, turns it to other animals, particularly ourselves and herself. So the speaker of the poem, it feels like this must be autobiographical, but I'm not entirely sure the speaker of the poem turns to themself a person who feels hunger, who's drawn to her mother when she feels hungry. Felt the rejection in my 9 year old body is how it says my body is what we're being drawn into and my nine year old body. And when I read this poem at the start, the first time I read it, I was kind of drawn into the up building of all of these lists and wondering where on earth is this going to go? And where it goes is in the direction of respect. My mother bought me a shirt to honor my conscience. That T shirt maybe, or a shirt, I don't know what it was. Blue animals on a pink shirt. I can see it. And the poem has culminated in this deft turn toward respect towards an animal from that animal's mother. Respect towards a child from that child's mother. I don't eat my friends. Written across my young belly. What a word to finish off with. I think of ways within which sometimes an animal might be presented on a menu where it'll speak about the belly of that animal. And by drawing us into that reflection on the human body, suddenly the poem has turned around entirely. I didn't know where it was going to go. And I was thrilled and challenged and provoked by what it is that Ruth Arrupe of Sanabria does here. The book in which this poem is collected is called Beasts Behave in Foreign Land. And I think of that as a kind of a book title in conversation with what it means to behave and change your behavior or not behave, and what it means to be foreign or local, that somehow I got the impression by the title of the book that things were going to shift, that perspectives were going to be messed around with. And the turn of this poem, which is called the Volta, it's a word in Italian from which we also get revolver or revolting or revolt or revolution. The turn of this poem, the announced turn of this poem comes so straightforwardly, comes so cleanly and comes with a real descent in the up building tone of drama. And instead there is a certain Kind of quietude that comes into this. A certain kind of silence. I'm sure different people have different relationships with what the opening, the length, the opening part of this poem is. People who do eat meat might find it amusing or entertaining, or people who have chosen not to might find it off putting or distasteful. But certainly the overwhelming nature of this building list of animals, of beasts, draws you in, draws you in with fascination. Maybe a terrible fascination, or maybe a delighted fascination. The verbs too are really compelling. Eaten, dipped, swallowed. And then this long list, like a cacophony of them. Shredded, cubed, ground, boiled, fried, broiled, pounded, breaded, wrapped, nestled, barbecued. And then there's other verbs too, that come in, grew up and reserved, and drew me and turn and refuse and I go, I first felt bought, drawn, I don't eat written. All these verbs change, especially towards the end, that somehow the relationship of language regarding power, about who's doing what verb to the other, breathing, being in the first part are really one sided. But I think certainly in the economy of this poem they change very particularly. There's an adjective that stands alone. Technically it's called an adverbial modifier. Hungry. And it feels to me like that word hungry is one of the things that changes the poem, one of the ways within which the energy of the poem changes, reaches a hinge and then goes back in itself and goes in a different direction. And our eyes are brought to look at something different. And suddenly it isn't just the person who has eaten a lot in their life. We are brought back to look at that person, but also to look at that person as they look at themselves, especially at this particular period of life when they were only. I keep thinking about that line drew me to my mother when hungry. And I wonder what is the hunger for food? Obviously that's the context of the poem. And here, el hugito, the juices, the meat, the. On the skillet sopped up with bread, maybe. But what comes after the scene where the mother respects her daughter's choice to stop eating meat and even buys her a shirt to honor her conscience? That scene makes me revisit and go back to the line that for me anyway, holds the twist, the turn. The volta drew me to my mother when Hungary. And I wonder what else is this young person hungry for? It seems to me that certainly based on what comes after that the young person is hungry for what it might mean to expect your mind independently and to think and to challenge yourself, not just to be challenged or challenge other people, but to challenge yourself. And to do that with a deep sense of independence. But loved independence, safe independence even to go against what your family is eating and what it is that they're choosing to eat. And to be able to go against your family without losing your family. And for that to be celebrated and valued and seen and respected. And even more than respected in the verb that this poem employs, to be honored. And the other word that goes along with that is that your conscience is seen. What an extraordinary thing, conscience and honor. Suddenly this poem deepens into a powerful sense of how is it that we are with each other. And that, I think, to feel like your choice and your conscience is honored in a place of love, especially when you're exhibiting some kind of a challenge or some kind of a change, that that means perhaps that you might be able to internalize it and honour yourself. And presumably, and hopefully with this, demonstrate that as an honouring of others too. One of the things I know about Ruth Eurupio Sanabria is that she's an educator. She's a teacher in New Jersey, I believe. And it does not surprise me because it feels to me like this is a poem written from the point of view of someone who knew what it was like to receive this. And. And who spends every day, it seems to me. I know I'm projecting, but I think it's probably a true projection. Who spends every day figuring out what it means to demonstrate honor for the conscience and independence and safety and growth and imagination of young people? I think to feel that your choice is honored, that your conscience is valued and seen, and that at a young age to make a choice that's going in a different direction than your family might, that means that you might be able to internalize what it means to hope, hold honor for yourself, to hold honor for other people, and to share that and to see that as a core feature that might shape a young life and shape a full adult life as well. Back again to the final words of the poem. My young belly. It is a way of inscribing a value of herself. My young belly. My. It's almost like daring. The abattoir of the early part of the poem saying, pay attention to this. Pay attention to what it is that I choose to wear upon the meat of my own body as a respect and a reflection on what it is that the meat of my body contains, namely a person, namely a being, namely conscience, namely honor, namely love. Carne by Ruth Irupe Sanabria I've eaten pork from pernil to chuletas to chitterlings. I've dipped my hands in oily paper bags of deep fried gizzards and chicken hearts. I've swallowed raw clams and oysters. I've eaten a stack of jellyfish, cubes of crocodile. I've eaten pigeon and sparrow. I've eaten bad chicken. I've swallowed the shiny, salty slimy pink and pitch caviar out of tiny Russian tins. I've eaten goat, bulbuls and ox and catfish, swordfish, monkfish and salmon. I've eaten prawns and scooped blood stew. And I have eaten red meat, shredded, cubed, ground, boiled, fried, broiled, tough, tender, young and old, pounded, breaded or wrapped in dough in phyllo in tortilla, nestled in the mashed potato platano, cornmeal or corn husk, tongue in marinade, brain, burger patty and barbecued intestines. I grew up with blood on my bread el jugito, the cow's little juice reserved for the growing child. The scent of the steak on the skillet drew me to my mother when hungry, periodically I turn. I refuse to take in flesh a meal, a day or even years. I go without. When I first felt the rejection in my nine year old body, my mother bought me a shirt to honor my conscience. Pink with happy farm animals drawn in blue. I don't eat my friends written across my young belly.
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Carne by Ruth Irupe Sanabria appears in Beasts Behave in Foreign land Published in 2017 by Red Hen Press.
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Thanks to them for permission to use
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this poem and to Frederick Courtright of the Permissions company. Poetry Unbound is Andrea Prevost, Carla Zanoni, Gerald Chen, Sparrow Murray, Chris Heagle, Bill Sigmund and me, Padre Gautuma. Our music is composed and provided by Gautam Srikishan and Blue Dot Sessions.
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These episodes were made in New York
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City on unceded Lenape land. Special thanks to Will Salwin, Nave Yan and Adam Morell at Digital Island Studios in Manhattan. Thanks as well to Frederick Courtright of the Permissions company. Poetry Unbound is an independent non profit production of the On Being project founded and led by Christa Tippett. This season of Poetry Unbound is made possible by a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. Our other funding partners include the Liana foundation, the Bedale foundation and Engaging the Census Foundation. Poetry Unbound would be nothing without the listening community. Thanks to all who listen, who read and give through our weekly Poetry Unbound
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substack or directly to On Being for
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links to the substack and to find out more about Poetry Unbound books and events. Visit poetryunbound.org.