The Pheasant

It’s one of those childhood memories, half-dreamed, bathed in a blue glint of reminiscence. I was perhaps seven or eight years old – a strong-willed, sensitive child with a penchant for red-faced rages followed by inconsolable weeping. I remember the pheasant now, through the cool glass of the window on that February morning – or

Bambi

Red drool in a river of shit But all the abattoir is dark: Despite the darkness, little sleep Under the starless roof. In a small suburban home Someone sucks the pulp from ribs And consoles his flabby boy: ‘Don’t worry son! Who doesn’t cry When they see Bambi’s mother die?’ By Matthew Chalmers

The Cygnet and the Lion

When I read that a cygnet, who had been brutally kicked in a London park, had died of its injuries I felt a flicker of sadness. The photos of the still creature, thick with fluff, as grey as a pensioner though perhaps not even a year old, with its wet, squinting eyes moved me. It

The Shortcomings of Environmental Veganism

Adopting veganism is, in my view, the greatest moral imperative of our age. When it comes to the perpetration of suffering there are no bigger culprits than the world’s meat and dairy industries. In terms of sheer numbers this simply must be the case: with 70 billion farmed animals on the planet, 50 billion of