Pigs In Paradise. Roger Maxson

lambs said, “Perhaps he’ll return Bruce to his former glory?”

      “He might perform tricks and pull a rabbit out of his ass because he doesn’t have a hat, and make the lame walk, Beatrice talk, and the blind see, but returning Bruce to his former self, I’m afraid that’ll happen when pigs fly.”

      “According to the barn boar, Joseph, pigs do fly,” Beatrice spoke.

      “Well, duh,” Julius said. “Everyone knows that. Joseph, who happens to be the father of our newly arrived savior Boris, is correct. All you have to do is die. Then go to heaven. And, and then to earn your wings, all you have to do is whistle a happy tune and grovel.”

      “Well, then, maybe he can help,” Beatrice spoke again.

      “It’s a miracle,” Julius said and flapped his wings.

      “Let’s ask him,” Beatrice added. “It can’t hurt.”

      “Yes, of course, surely he’ll do it for the glory of his father who art in heaven.”

      “I thought Joseph was his father?”

      “He’s adopted.”

      The Large White waded out to the interloper, his snout an inch from the Berkshire’s snout, almost touching at times.

      “Cousin,” Howard the Baptist said.

      “Don’t kiss me,” the boar replied.

      “Wonder if he’s completely feral or only half?” Beatrice pondered.

      “I’m afraid the half that thinks,” Julius said.

      “So, it is you who has returned,” said Howard, “the seventh piglet of the seventh liter of Sal the Sow, Boris, the runt of the liter.”

      “I am who they say I am.”

      Howard baptized the pig, pouring muddy water over the head and shoulders of Boris, the Berkshire Boar.

      “I protest.”

      “I believe you protest too much.”

      “I am without sin.”

      “You’re still a pig. Besides, if you plan to be led by the tusks by the mule, you’ll need all the help you can get. He is bad news, but I’ll let you discover just how narrow the path is for yourself. But heed my warning, he is not a brother or a friend to the pig or any animal for that matter.”

      “You forget, friend, I am He who was sent by my Father to save all domesticated farm animals from sin and a life spent in captivity.”

      “Where do you plan to lead your sinners, messiah?”

      “To freedom, paradise found among the mountains of the Sinai and away from this place, the corruption of civilization.”

      “Oh, of course, the garden,” Howard said incredulously. “Stay here with me under the stars. Do not follow the mule or the hermit monk, for it is they who will lead you down the path of destruction.”

      “It is because of them that I am here,” Boris said, “to deliver us from evil.”

      “Who will deliver you from evil?”

      As Mel approached the pond, Boris took his position next to him. “You are good and pure,” Mel said, “beyond sin. You will do your charges well.” Mel looked at the Baptist. Then turned away to join the others.

      “And your daddy’s will,” Howard snorted.

      * * *

      The other animals, including Mel by this time, stood under the branches of the great olive tree out of the sun and watched in amazement as the two boars rammed each other, shoved, butted heads, pushing against one another until finally the newly baptized had had enough, and retreated from the pond and wandered off.

      That night for reasons known only to the moshavnik Perelman, he separated the Jersey from the others and placed her in the stall with the newly arrived boar. Between the laborers, though, rumor had it that Perelman may have wanted the two, the Jersey and the Berkshire boar, to mate even though she was a cow already freshened with a calf, and he was a pig, something about wanting the reddish-coated hide rubbing off on her.

      “Oh, I don’t like being called a pig. I mean, I am what I am, and I like who I am. I’m Boris the Boar, the Great Wild Boar, Savior of all animals, great and small. Or at least I shall be. For now, though, I’ll settle for the Great Wild Boar of the West. It’s the name pig, though, and as far as pigs go, we are loathed by so many of the human species. We have humans to blame for this, of course, and one man in particular for all this name-calling business. Oh, how I’d love for our species across the earth to go by another name, like buffalo. I’ve always liked the name buffalo or bison. I can imagine life for us would be very different if we were buffalo. Or gazelle! Doesn’t that have a lovely ring to it, gazelle? Gazelle pigs, lean and muscular and strong, of course, and able to go out into the world proud, not afraid to hold their heads up.”

      “Then Muhammad would no longer be a friend to the pig.”

      “Yes, there’d be tradeoffs. I shouldn’t complain, really. Call us what they may, we’d still be pigs in the eyes of many and loathed no matter what we’re called. It could have been worse, I suppose. He could have been called cockroaches.”

      “Why were you and Howard fighting?” Blaise said. “Not long after he baptized you, you both were fighting, butting heads?”

      “He said he was perfect, and the bigger pig, but I, being who I am, pushed back, because I am the greater boar.”

      Had she not already fallen asleep Blaise would have agreed.

      4

      When Fetuses Fall from the Backsides of Cows

      Mel walked along the fence, keeping within earshot of Levy and his friend Ed, the two orthodox Jews from before. Levy was listening to an iPod with wireless earbuds as they passed through the moshav.

      “The Americans are coming!” Ed said.

      “We’re saved!” Levy replied with the iPod and earbuds in his ear.

      “It appears Perelman might be.”

      “What does that mean?” Levy removed the iPod.

      “He’s looking to sell the moshav.”

      “Sell the moshav? He can’t do that.”

      “The livestock, I mean,” Ed said. “He’s looking to sell off the livestock, the pigs, goats, chickens anyway.”

      “Americans are coming to Israel to buy pigs?”

      “They are in the market, yes, but their real interest is the red calf. So, while they’re here, for one thing, they might as well be here for the other.”

      “I see. Evangelicals again on their way to save us from ourselves.”

      “They’re good country people,” Ed said.

      “Of course,” Levy said, “Christian fundamentalists. Why else would they be interested in the red calf?”

      “Good eatin’?” Ed said.

      “Perelman is selling the Jersey and her calf?”

      “I believe so. They’re interested in its outcome for us and them.”

      Levy placed the earbuds back in his ears. Those people, or as they say, ‘them people.’”

      Mel stopped at the end of the property line where the two fences came to a point at fence-post corners. The two Jews continued on their way past the farm, following the road north.

      That night Mel shared with the rest a vision he had had from a dream and it was prophecy. “I see men arriving at the farm. They will offer us salvation and paradise on earth, but what they want is to enslave us once again