It doesn’t bear thinking about this leather business

The skin of the cow
that poor over worked
soul who in the dark stable once
lurked
she may have had 3 calves
all of them taken
she carried them 9 months
but she was forsaken
if humans need cows milk
then baby calves
are stolen and slaughtered
those are the two halves
of the great dairy business
they keep from your view
they won’t spend a penny
more than they have to
so its curtains for male babies
they have to go
split from their mama
who will cry and bellow
this is the life of a cow
its the yield
of milk she can give
as the margins then build
but when she’s tired out
and the milk does reduce
again she is off
its rather a ruse
off to the slaughterhouse
leather and beef
at least some more profit
ah! that’s a relief!

But here was a lady
who gave such a lot
she worked like the clappers
she just was not
a waster like the farmer
she, really tried
pregnant 4 times
all that was denied
as she got older and slower
you’d think
some kind of retirement
oh no on the brink
then to the slaughterhouse
yes straight away
and so limping badly
she is on her way

a little light sunshine
may fall on her back
as she mounts the truck
and then hits the sack
she is tired she is weary
she is positively lame
but she’s dragged off
at the other end
yea just the same

nobody cares
for the life she has lead
the torture
the emotion stress
now ahead
all that is left
is the ultimate price
slashed across the throat
and hauled up in a trice
as she bleeds out
and chokes on her blood
how she feels
eyeing the butcher below
who reveals
the meanest of streaks
as he cuts and he strips
the skin from her body
he unnervingly rips
this precious old lady
maybe she is 5
a baby in our terms
and no more alive
than the floor her blood
pours onto
she has now gone
why I don’t want leather
ever to don
to me it is obvious
then comes the rest
the tannery
brain tanning yea its the best
chromium mercury solvents galore
so pollution is rife
of that I am sure
durable flexible that’s what they say
but of that poor tortured cow
who just had to pay
nobody cares she is just gone just lost
and this really truthfully
is the vile cost