10 Beats on the Problem of Free Chickens
We had thirteen chickens and no idea
how to contain them. They were free poultry
as bold and certain as birds can manage;
they treated their coop as a daytime lounge.
Preferred were the low branches of white pine
or the comforting gnarl of cedar trees
or the seats of an overturned row boat;
though even more, high in our porch rafters,
where clucking and cooing and molting thrummed
steady, rhythmic. So we’d sit, dodging shit.