On Throwing the Lobster into the Sea

I’d like to eat Lobster tonight

But now I realize I don’t have the heart

to boil it alive to eat.

Isn’t it like this?

Up close, after the commercial,

a seamy underside, pores too large,

the wrong flavor too late in the meal

an empty apartment in the city of death.

Let’s not pretend to want anymore

and throw all of our being

into the sea,

while we’re still alive.

Now we can taste

Fresh salt spray like

the wedding of life and death

and live and let live.

[Allen DeLoach wrote a poem in response; click here to read it.]

From the Spring 1984 issue of Inquiring Mind (Vol. 1, No. 1)

Art, Food, Poetry

Jack Kornfield trained as a Buddhist monk in the monasteries of Thailand, India and Burma. He has taught meditation internationally since 1974 and is a founding teacher of the Insight Meditation Society and Spirit Rock Meditation Center. He is author of many books and audio programs, including A Path with Heart (Bantam, 1993), and After the Ecstasy, the Laundry (Bantam, 2001).

On Throwing the Lobster into the Sea

By Jack Kornfield

From the Spring 1984 issue of Inquiring Mind (Vol. 1, No. 1)

Text and image © 1984–2023 by Jack Kornfield

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