Aguelhoc
One hundred chickens
Came to roost
On the heads of one hundred
Kneeling soldiers
In Aguelhoc
One hundred bullets
Sent the chickens flying
With the blood stains
Into the desert sand.
Chickens will roost
Determinedly.
They keep coming back
And they ignore your efforts
To shoo them off.
For roost they will
over and over and at the same spot.
It's better to let the
Chickens have their way.
As smart as you are
you can't win
And you have to ask--
What is the point?
If the chickens want to roost
In the only tree in your courtyard
And that's where
You want to park your chair,
Give up, wear a hat.
The chickens will roost
Where they want
And if they want to roost
On the shoulders of a president
Who has been winking
At drug dealers and terrorists,
In vain hopes that they will attack
His neighbors, while he gives them a blind eye—
Let it be.
And if they roost on the shoulders
Of the mutineers who deposed him
Let it be.
And if they come to rest
On the drug dealers who
Cheat the terrorists or vice versa.
Let it be. Roost they will.
And let them roost on the
Powerful allies
That flooded the desert
With cash and guns because
They thought the local rulers
Corrupt enough to play ball
With the drugsters, and the Islamofascists,
And the pluralistic liberals, all of whom
Cruise the boulevards of Paris.
And the chickens roost in the Eiffel Tower
And they roost on academic boards
And they roost on musicians' keyboards
And all over the internet
They roost, and peck, and drop
Dreams,
And scratch out nightmares
Into the dust
Of the blood stained desert sand
In Aguelhoc.
—John H. Sime, Readstown, WI
