artwork: ralph murre
Roosters
and Hens
by Wendy Vardaman
At bedtime Mother told us about growing
up on her grandparents’ farm, chasing
chickens
across the yard, peering into their
dark home.
How Grandfather got the axe when
Grandmother
wanted a bird for the stew pot and the
time
she saw a crestfallen rooster on his
feet,
the head cut off. Terrified at eight or
nine,
she ran blindly in the other direction,
only to have him turn and chase her
toward
the fence where she set one new
white-sandaled foot
on a fresh cow pie. Grandfather roared,
doubling
over his blade while she cried, hopped
up and down,
tried to shake the shit from her toes.
The sandals
were never the same, despite
Grandmother’s “Good
as new,” when she finished scratching
at the straps.
Mother said she could never wear open
shoes
again, and left the farm, still a girl,
to work
in the city, marry my father, and buy
painted porcelain roosters that
collected
there, props from an unfinished
childhood. They hung
from avocado walls, crowed at the sink,
caught
grease and dirt near the stove,
presided over
the orange island counter top where my
dad
also roosted with soliloquies and beers
he never got himself but called for
from his
bar-stool perch, demanding that we
leave our ranch
house coops, yelling no matter how
long it took,
Mother clucking, “Wouldn’t hurt you two
to help.”
~ previously published in Appleseeds (Sacred Fools Press)
