I bought them when they were chicks.
            I imagined they would grow up
            and I would turn them out on ninety acres
            to be watchdogs with an instinct, a poetry    
            of sounds, warning every movement around them.

            I repaired the smoke house in spite of the tricks
            that kept showing up,
            cracks in the flooor big enough for snake takers,
            hawks resting in the tall oak from which to see
            and owls at night. I could hear them.    

            When they were grown, but tame.
            They had no instinct to roost in trees
            but huddled on the ground not in the house at night.
            The two smaller hens were gone the next morning
            and the four rooster did not appear to mourn them.

            After another night two roosters were gone, the same
            way as the others, but the last two went in. I locked these
            in and they hid behind a sheet of plywood out of sight.
            The next morning
            I fed and watered them and locked the door for them.