Susie Patlove

The rooster pushes his head high among the hens, trying to be what he feels he must be, here in the confines of domesticity. Before the tall legs of my presence, he bristles and shakes his ruby comb. Little man, I want to say the hens know who they are. I want to ease his mistaken burden, want him to crow with the plain ecstasy of morning light as it finds its winter way above the woods. Poor outnumbered fellow, how did he come to believe that on his plumed shoulders lay the safety of an entire flock? I run my hand down the rippled brindle of his back, urge him to relax, drink in the female pleasures that surround him, of egg laying, of settling warm-breasted in the nest of this brief and feathered time.