GOLDIE

I am already on my knees. It is the best way to dig weeds
out of  dry garden soil.

Sweat coils down my neck.  My tongue plays with grit between my teeth.

I glance up at the hot sun as I toss my itchy  hair away from my eyes…..and there she is!  I am face to beak with Goldie.  She has always been my favorite chicken.  Here we are gazing in to
each other.

Somehow she has fluffed herself and  brought the brilliant sun orb beneath her feathered wings.  She has never looked quite this golden.  Her lit feathers rise and fall with each breath.   My own breath slows.

Everything else falls away, weeds, sweat, grit, sore knees.
Now it is just this prayer between us.

The two of us and the burning questions we have never found the courage to ask each other.  Not
until this moment.

“How DO you lay an egg?” I probe

“How do YOU get anywhere without wings?” she demands.

Feathers rise and fall. Eye to eye.  Breath to breath.

She takes  me under her  golden wings  and whispers,  “Eggs come through my body  but the REAL source of eggs?  Patience.  Eggs come from patience.

She smiles, if beaks can smile, and says,  “Now its your turn.”
She tilts her head in the way chickens do to get the full picture.

I reach deep inside, imploring to the garden gods
for  help, to let her see my mind.
To show her,  how I can fly without wings.

 

Ann Strack