Blue Eyed Stranger

It's late, later than I'd like it to be
but I must write.

I've just finished The Count of Monte Cristo
I can't talk about it now
I must let it wait a while
as I think about it slowly
and let it sink in
until I'm ready to read another book

I'll write about a different day
in which a dog and an unfortunate chicken
crossed paths

This is the dog

I saw him through the french doors as he ran past our deck

a stranger dog with no person

I heard our neighbor's dad shout and saw him thwack the dog

and then grab its collar and drag him out of our yard

I said, "Tasha, there's a dog outside." She went to look

and a few minutes later I heard the doorbell ring

I saw it was Tasha out there so I shot back the bolt

but the bell rang again

so I opened the door myself and

there on the step was the dog wining and jumping

Tasha holding him by the chain around his neck

"He killed a chicken," she said. I said, "Which one?"

"Bryn. Could you opened the garage?"

I did and found a nylon rope which we looped through the ring on the dog's collar

We hadn't the slightest where he was from

Tasha tried the neighbors across from us

because they have a rather large dog like him but

the neighbor, who makes cars

had never seen the dog in his life so Tasha tied him to a tree

(the dog, that is)

I walked around back of the house in my bare feet

on the cold stones 

I had on only a cardigan and a skirt

but I didn't want to put on a coat because then I'd lose the point

of being outside, besides

I wasn't cold

I had enough warm inside my body to keep me happy

I found poor Kail crouching in the corner of the chicken shed

crooning in a shook, questioning voice

I told her it was ok and told her to stay put

as I called for Punk and Tarzan

At my whistle, Tarzan came crashing out of the woods

and shot into the shed beside Kail

Punk did not come

I found Bryn

dead

on the ground by the deck

Her fluffy underneath feathers

lay scattered around her

and her eyes'd already turned white

Tasha took poor Bryn by the feet and said she would try to bleed her

Tasha liked Bryn the best

I'd have preferred if the dead one was Kail

who is a stupid chicken

Tasha said that the dog had broken Bryn's back

so that she'd had to wring her neck

because the old girl was in lots of pain

Tasha knows what mercy is

I gave the dog a bowl of water

which he drank out of curiosity, rather than thirst

and I managed to get close and touch his head

and calm him down

because he was wild

he didn't even know how to sit when I told him to

I offered the dog something to eat and patted him again

I asked Dad if we could keep him

and guess what Dad said

he said, "No."

Tasha called the police and I watched the dog

from the library windows

He tipped the water out of his bowl then turned it upright again

Then he chewed his rope right in two

which sent us scrambling

Calvin ran for a cable and his biners

and Tasha coaxed the dog with a piece of chicken skin

but he ran at me instead

I took him by the collar and we attached him to the tree again

I petted him until my hands froze

and then went inside to watch through the window till the police came

to take the beautiful dog away

I wanted him so bad

but it was not to be

A police man came and chucked the crazy dog into the passenger seat

of his cab, the place where prisoners sit

and drove off

I want that dog

A few days later, Tasha plucked Bryn and removed her insides

Guess what we found inside her

a dozen eggs

each at a different stage of development

I'd show you a picture, but I sat on them before I could take it

I am clumsy

don't ask me how I managed

And Tasha cooked dear Bryn, the chicken with the crooked beak

and we ate her for dinner

She tasted fine, ok for a layer

though all she was

was skin and bones

In Memory of Bryn

~

[I'm afraid this is the best picture I could find of her]

See, grass used to get caught in her crooked beak 

...And all the best to the beautiful Huskey

If he was mine, I'd have called him Stormy