Poem – Cockerel

Cockerel

There you stand: a weather-vane
with one foot held up as if you could pluck
East and West from the very ends
of the earth. You splay
the yellow crackle-glaze of your toes and step
forward, eyeing me with a shiny bit
you might have pecked
from the dust.

The fleshy rinds on your head
make a ramshackle bouquet
when you elongate your neck, part
that kettle beak and start to pour yourself out
and out; the undulating effort travelling
the muscles of your throat as if
you can rouse the world

from its shell of cloud
and molten
yolk.

 

Featured Poem by The Interpreter’s House magazine, originally published in Issue 55. Since re-published in Twelve Poems about Chickens (Candlestick Press, 2015).