It's Still Life

Reflections on a Red Hen

We bowed our heads,
reflected on
what that chicken’s life
had been.
What it’s like to eat
stones and grain and
wisp-winged bugs.
What it’s like to sleep
locked up, and maybe
cower under cover
when thunder comes.
What it’s like to stop,
to watch billowed clouds
and rain drops fall, or
what it’s like to never
dance or spin in place
until the ground filters
into dizzy haze, or
what it’s like to have
no shoulders, or never
see trout in the shadows
of a bridge, or what it’s
like to escape
a butcher’s blade
only to be caught
by foxes’ jaws. So,
we said a silent prayer
for that chicken’s life.
So final. The end.
Fin.

this week’s Sunday Whirl words: grain, lock, (barge), filter, wisp, spin, blade, reflect, billow, shoulder, fin. bridge