Rooster Love

     The chickens are always so much fun to watch, but I especially enjoy watching the roosters.   They know their job is to protect the girls, so they crow alarm when a hawk flies overhead and crow about supper when I take slop out to share with the hens.  But, they also love to crow for attention.  They crow in the morning, long before the sun comes up.  They crow in the hen house. They crow outside.  They crow just because they can.  They are cock-a-doodle Carusos, standing tiptoe, reaching deep into their diaphragms for air, and belting out melodic morning arias.

      But, they don't crow when they are trying to seduce the ladies.  Besides living to protect the hens, roosters also exist just so they can get them some chicken love.  When a rooster wants love, he is strangely silent.  He morphs from a sassy soloist to a shy salsa dancer.

ROOSTER LOVE

The rooster struts

and scratches

and crows

He jumps to the left

and bounces on his toes.

He waggles his wattle

and he cocks his eye,

quicksteps to the right

when the hen passes by.

The hen scratches seeds

with her eyes on the ground

She never looks up, 'cause

she's always looking down.

The rooster on her right

isn't nearly as thrilling

as the bug in the ground

for which she is drilling.