It is cold by Arizona standards as I walk in my slippers to the barn to do the last feeding for Blossom and her three little goat friends, I walk in and they hear me and start asking for their bottles, I glance over to see what Blossom is doing and she is laying quietly, eyes closed, she seems to be nursing in her sleep, my heart aches, I wonder, did she ever nurse her mother, most likely no, Im sure she couldnt stand, if she could have stood and nursed surely the dairy would have kept her, if she had shown any signs of being able to produce for them, a beautiful red perfect heifer.. how did she get this way I still wonder.. did they have to pull her out of her mother by the jaw is that how it was broken, and her teeth too.. how was her eye damaged.. she seemed to have been dragged by the scrapes and wounds on her knees, front of her tiny little soft hooves and bald patches on her hips.. the woman, who had her and seven of her brothers in the back of the hot pickup truck, trying to just get them to her place alive, hoping to at least save them from being shot that day, she said this one had just been born.. why would they drag her, toss her in a truck surely to die on a three hour trip in the back of a truck being trampled by the healthy little bull calves they had no use for, or did she just lay somewhere, being pawed and pushed by her mother urging her to get up, get up and nurse before they find you, I can imagine her saying, trying to get her perfect baby up, the baby she has carried for almost three hundred days, moving and growing in her belly, hoping for a female, a heifer, she would be worn out but she would live, then this tiny thing, unable for whatever reason, to stand, to nurse, to be pulled from her mother to be raised to be a producer, but instead, maimed, injured, bruised and half dead, tossed into the back of a pickup truck.. who hurt you tiny girl, she wakes up and looks at me, tongue hanging out, little jaws trying to heal, knowing she wants to eat hay but instead curls it into her mouth and unable to chew it, stores it in her little pouch until I give her a massage and half of it falls out. but she keeps trying, she wants to stand, when her infected leg heals, she will.. she can kick, boy can she kick when I give her a shot in the rear, and she licks those baby goats who are now her roomates and her friends, she is a lover, she knows me, knows my voice, and that of her best friend who helps her, massages her and comes to see her almost daily, she stumbles over to get to her, moos that soft little moo that she blessed her first with, she wants to walk, eat normally.. until then she drinks as much milk as Ill give her, and turns on the suction, curls her tongue and somehow ingests the mush I make for her four times a day. She is beautiful, whether her jaw ever heals or not, she will only see from one eye, but she sees, she sees everything she needs to see. She sees people who love her, who will never ever hurt her, people she will see every day of her life and all that will be required of her here tonite and forever, is that she be happy.
Posted on: Thu, 31 Oct 2013 04:07:53 +0000
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