I keep trying to write a poem about roosters but write the chickens missing feathers on my family’s farm instead.

by Olivia Mettler

Death’s a shining sun but roosters only see
Pearly white skull hung from a farmer’s apple tree

Animal blood fills memories the children keep of home
Like unwatched chickens eating egg and bone

Runt roosters face death to sunburst into men
Seek backpay in the bodies of plump hens


Olivia Mettler is a poet from Minnesota. She spends her time pretending she can talk to birds and wandering the cemeteries of Atlanta.