Gerade's Chooks. (Poetry).

GERADE'S CHOOKS

Coral Hull

gerade's chooks roost on the back of a quilted
lounge, by the open fire & shelves of herbs,
licorice & fragrant biscuits, mountain black
chooks, sooty fat Cinderellas, falling like ash
through his calm brown hands, & a chook on
shaky legs, taking her first step from the crate,
her head bob & deep throaty chuckle, as she
lands in the rich cold dirt, one webbed foot,
one winter at canyon leigh, turning the land
over, into new leaf litter, showing me the earth
from underneath, as one hug from gerade,
edged her into each day, the eye droppers of
liquid, the teaspoons of mash, a bath m the
dust, the excitement of dawn, not previously
seen from the sheds, with a nudge gerade's
chooks fell into morning, clucking &
scratching in the sun, upturned rain water in
the clay dished & roosted in the low branches,
of trees that hung on high white clouds, high
as a chook's neck lifting, on ruffled up
feathers & outstretched wings, until canyon
leigh is filled entirely, by chooks regaining
strength, rescued & recovering around the
country, featherless & beakless, these hens that
weighed barely a kilo, have grown to fill the
space between trees, that regenerate with living
chook undergrowth, fat as toadstools, whilst
gerade crouches low & private, his gentle
cheek on her shy black feather, & a whisper to
a quieter hen injured from the inside, to the
brittle bones & broken limbs, of chickens
gathering in a hop hop dash, to be the first m
at the food dish, I looked out from the bush
dunnie between two wooden slats, into the
dappled light down a way from the house, &
it twenty ex-battery hens, squatting
patiently, bright eyed on their twisted feet,
rumbling like thunderclouds, waiting for me to
emerge, so they can rush after me in single
file, through the scrub, along the rocky bush
track, crazy, broody, clucking affectionately,
we are forginven so easily, by chooks

Coral Hull, Australian writer has published extensively. Her poems have appeared in anthologies and literary journals in Australia, America and Canada. She is presently completing her first novel.