Gnawed Bones

Chickens

40 CHICKens all blasted night you fretted, knew they were outside the wire, your mother’s whole flock, the reds and the plumper whites, scratching for pillbugs curled up tight, your body lithe as you ran through the garden, careful of strawberries ripe on pallets of mulch, careful of staked tomatoes and teepees of sweet peas, of butterbeans waxing full as moons. Then the sun came up. The moon faded down to its daytime self. You were returned though you never quite believed it and how could you to this half life in your half shell, left side limp, unsure which side of the story was yours, what you had left hard to tell, the loneliness of seeing what everyone else couldn’t yet see. Candling those eggs. ...