Stewardship
© 2007 Mark Pearce

Treat your chickens kindly.
Let them walk on God’s green Earth.
Let them promenade in sun light
With a shelter for their berth.

Don’t you pin ‘em up in boxes
Or a tiny wire hold
Suspended over fecal sluices
Where their wings cannot unfold.

Don’t feed ‘em antibiotics
Within each and every bite.
Don’t breed ‘em so they cannot walk.
You know that isn’t right.

Don’t grow ‘em by the zillion
And extend them with fake light.
Don’t snip and grind away their beaks
Because they’re wedged too tight.

Don’t make ‘em breathe-in air that’s choked
With amoniated dust.
Don’t make ‘em drink from water troughs
All filled with mold and rust.

Let ‘em harvest bugs and grasses
And scratch pebbles from the ground.
I implore you, treat ‘em kindly.
They’ll be the best chickens around.