SACRIFICE (draft—missing text—no hard copy)

SACRIFICE 

there it was, the song 

of the broody pullet 

growing stronger each morning 

from the apartment balcony 

my wake up call, 

familiar out of childhood,

crooning hen

as she tried out her song

from her perch on third story 

an incongruous pastorality 

in the neighborhood

both waked and soothed us 

and kept us anchored t

o the rhythms of the past

But when the woman

began to sing on the balcony

the chicken’s song rose to terror pitch

as I watched the shadow on the wall

the woman sang raising her left hand

then her right with the chicken in it 

three times to the east

then silence. The motion 

hypnotized the chicken....

10/21/02

This is one of those ASCII swallowed poems. I was able to save this much, but not the ending.  I don't think I have a hard copy either. 

more ASCII orphans

My cousin and I call our aunts “bags”; we’re bags in training....so I can relate to the handbag...after all, the ubiquitous backpack (this is where I usually break out into o a rousing chorus of broody chicken calls to the consternation of my neighbors...

did I mention the Eretreans have taken to slaughtering chickens every Sunday from a balcony in downtown Oakland? You can tell when the drums begin to pulse.)

The river of cars on 580 slowed to a trickle

not the raging current of the workweek