Poet Laura: Fables and Foxy Chickens

The ubiquitous chicken, through time and literature, has been represented in storytelling. They can be a symbol of fertility and abundance, a metaphor for prosperity, and in western cultures, perhaps cowardice. Remember “chicken, chicken, chicken” on the playground on a dare? Bug chickens have also been known to symbolize masculinity. I suspect that might relate to the proud crowing roosters, as the species is known for their “pecking order,” much like the class connotations we humans have fallen prey to.

Even the bible references chickens. Way back in time, thank goodness there were seven pairs of chickens taken aboard Noah’s Ark, thus scrambled eggs every morning. Really, every morning there’d be seven roosters rousting Noah’s menagerie. Whose idea was that? The coop would have been happier and more productive if there’d been one rooster and thirteen hens.

And we cannot neglect Chaucer, nor the storytellers that went before him, for Chanticleer is robust in literature. In the following excerpt is a translation to a more modern English of The Nun’s Priest’s Tale where Chaucer teaches a lesson.

And in the yard a cock called Chanticleer
In all the land, for crowing, he’d no peer.
His voice was merrier than the organ gay
On Mass days, which in church begins to play;
More regular was his crowing in his lodge
Than is a clock or abbey horologe.

Chanticleer and the fox, Chaucer’s characters in verse, teach that pride goes before a fall, yet the cock’s gullibility and then, wit, led to his outfoxing the fox. Both the cock and the fox have been fooled and foiled, each learning a lesson. To be certain, I have not forgotten the slow struggle to read verse in middle English back in my college days! For example, “On messe-days that in the chirche gon” which is line four above. And here is another Chaucer verse from his Chanticleer tale:

This Chanticleer stood high upon his toes,
Stretching his neck, and both his eyes did close,
And so did crow right loudly, for the nonce;
And Russel Fox, he started up at once,
And by the gorget grabbed our Chanticleer,
Flung him on back, and toward the wood did steer,
For there was no man who as yet pursued.

And then in the early twentieth century, Walter de la Mare wrote his poem “Chicken.”

Chicken

Clapping her platter stood plump Bess,
And all across the green
Came scampering in, on wing and claw,
Chicken fat and lean:
Dorking, Spaniard, Cochin China,
Bantams sleek and small,
Like feathers blown in a great wind,
They came at Bessie’s call.

—Walter de la Mare

His words take us to those old farmyard scenes of calling the chickens. Bessie is their queen, but do remember this rule: don’t always come with food for chickens or they may turn on you if you come empty-handed.

But on the other hand, chickens are earth’s gift, providing the perfect food—eggs! Or pot pie. We relish them and miss them when they’re scarce. Here is a scene from my early years.

Sunday Supper

With a cup of barley and bugs
I lure feathered hens to commune,

clucking and skipping, two-steppin’
toward breakfast and chicken scratch.

Gay hens shine cheery in the sun,
fresh air offering the new day.

Grandpa would cosset downy chicks,
tending to the keen creatures

while Grandma merrily ambles
to the yard, her hatchet in hand.

—Sandra Fox Murphy

Now as to reading poetry to the chickens, I read Last Night I Dreamed of Chickens by Jack Prelutsky. Here is an excerpt:

Last night I dreamed of chickens,
There were chickens everywhere,
They were standing on my stomach,
They were nesting in my hair,
….

So—let us take a hard turn to the west, to that part of Texas I love. In May I spent a weekend in Llano, Texas, and there I met some chickens. There were three that I considered a gang and called them Blaze, Spitfire, and Medusa. Where do they live? At the Sundown honky-tonk, on the patio where Bobby Dean is singing “Turn the Lights Down Low” on the other side of the wall by the dance floor. There was a small coop on the patio, but these chickens were free roamers and quite at home with the crowd. The gang had their own shelf, so they no longer had to roost on the barbecue grill. Those three mean girls on the shelf were not interested at all in poetry, but a hen I called Matilda walked over and was quite smitten with the rhythm of Jack Perlutsky’s poem, so we bonded. I discovered that every bar and honky-tonk in Llano had a bar dog or a bar cat or, as I discovered, bar chickens! For a girl who loves digging up Texas history, I felt right at home in the wild west where every town had a saloon or two.

Matilda

The Gangsters

Sundown Honkytonk

While doing some reading in Llano, I discovered the evocative work of poet Andrea Cohen, and yes—she wrote a fable with a chicken, a la Chanticleer. From her poem “Fable,” here is an excerpt:

“… It would be better if we didn’t

have to moonlight as morality lessons.
Exactly, says the chicken. I’d like to let

loose once in a while, I’d like to
stretch my wings, she says. Yes,

says the fox. ….

But that term “chicken scratch” makes me think of my dad’s handwriting. When I left home and moved to San Diego, my dad would write me letters, and it would take me a few days to transcribe them into words I could read. Grateful always to hear from Dad. But as a girl at my grandparents’ home, I had chores, for there was a pecking order at the farm.

Sovereignty

The sun peeped from the horizon
and the rooster crowed his morning
song, split the light and dark,
stirred the air and the peacock
stared. He ruffled his feathers blue
and green, proclaiming himself
the patriarch and veered to preen.

The hens all turned their heads.

—Sandra Fox Murphy

Your Turn: Chicken Poems

Write about your experiences with chickens. Were they friendly or not? Easter baby chicks … remember when they were dyed Easter colors, and now that is frowned upon. And what about chickens raised in factories or cooped versus cage-free and free-roaming? Always watch out for the rooster! Remember, “the only things that succeed by sitting are chickens.” – Mustafa Dönmez

Photo by Linda, Creative Commons license via Flickr.  “Chicken” by Walter de la Mare is in the Public Domain. Post and post photos by Sandra Fox Murphy. Poems by the author used with permission.

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Sandra Fox Murphy

Sandra grew up everywhere as a USAF dependent, rootless, and when exposed to the beatnik poets at Indian Valley College, was smitten with poetry. After retirement from the U.S. Geological Survey, she found herself immersed in storytelling, and ensconced in Texas, researches small-town history and is the author of six novels, including Let the Little Birds Sing, the beginning of the Fidelia McCord Trilogy inspired by a young girl who came to Texas in 1847. Aging Without Grace is her first poetry collection, and her poems have been published at the Ocotillo Review, The Write Launch, Humans of the World, The River, and in several anthologies. Sandra's muses are the environment, history, and the natural beauty and mystery of place.

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