on suicidal pheasants

the hunting season must be close
small dead feathered bodies
litter the country roads and lanes
as i travel north to south
and south to north homeward bound
what skill is required to shoot a bird
which mostly walks and hardly flies
a pretty fowl a pleasure to the eye
though strangely lacking in road sense
especially as the shooting time draws near
the fat plumpness of a well fed summer
seems drawn to thoughts of reckless suicide
waiting still at country road side
to hurl a feathered self beneath the wheels
of thoughtless speeding metal machines
those with guns wait for the day
restrictions lifted from their pheasant prey
to trundle through the fields autumn wet
intent to shoot the rising bird
a feathered harvest gathered hung and plucked
eaten

who would eat this scrawny game bird
grown wild more bones than flesh
an autumn bounty owed to the country dweller
who still loves to tease a trout
and hook a salmon for his supper
the countryman who looking sky ward
will see wild geese or ducks
upon the wing and shoot them
dead

we once ate blackbird lark and swan
with relish as was our custom
these savage times now passed
viewed as ancestral absurdities
soon perhaps we will leave the pheasant harvest
for the fox to hunt and kill
and steel machines careless and fast moving
whose siren call is heard
by suicidal birds of very little brain


All materials Copyright © 2004-2007 by Eryll Oellermann