Poetry

Chicken Barns

"Leute sagen das während die alten Tagen ... "

Some Mennonites say,   that during the old days
When the chicken barn was more like a home,
And hens and the rooster thought free to roam
On sawdust floors, perch and laze on rails

In warm rooms with capacious nests of straw,
Meet at feeding trays and the water urn;
Laying duties done perhaps adjourn
To the courtyard, join the cabala

Foraging for bugs and grazing grass,
Panic en masse hallucinating a fox,
Peck the hierarchic, orthodox paradox,
And service the rooster a wanton piece-of-ass;

    That eggs collected in tinny-eared pails,
And grain-fattened capons schmeckt praise.

Podcast: Chicken Barns

© Elmer Wiens