Rebecca Gayle Howell

How to Kill a Hen

Enter the night coop

whistling

 

Through your teeth

sing

 

In this awful world of sorrow

sing

 

In this wicked path of sin

 

Tuck her

under your arm

 

and walk away

from the laying birds

 

the cuckold-morning

rising in their dumb wings

 

Walk away from sleep

 

Make sure her hollow bones

alone will be warmed by it

 

your wordless bellows

breast

 

For this is your gift to her

 

Tell her

you never think of tomorrow

 

Tell her

what youd lose in the end

 

Enter the night coop

whistling

 

Leave whistling

Climb the dust hill

 

When you get up

to the house

 

ring once the orbit

of your failing

 

Over your head

a breaking neck

 

For this is your gift to her:

 

You can hear your savior calling

barefaced and feather red

 

 


This poem first appeared in Still (Spring 2012) and is from Render / An Apocalypse (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2013).