Butcher The Last Chicken

photo by Pearl Beerhorst

The other day a friend from the neighborhood called up and told me that all his chickens had been killed by a racoon except for one.  He explained how they didn't want to winter over just one chicken and asked if we would want to either add it to our hen house or butcher it for one of our meals. (They are vegetarians and could apparently not bring themselves to pass the bird into the great beyond with their own hands.)

He came by with the bird and the next morning I butchered it on the stump shown in the picture above. What is interesting to me is that I had written the song Judgement day just a few weeks before my friend told me about their mishap with the racoon.  This recent event reminds me that music prepares me for where life wants to take me next.

 Judgement Day  (go here to listen)      

                                   
For every bell that is ringing, for every saw that cuts the wood                                                  
There’s a girl some where crying, and a boy that’s misunderstood
Now there’s a sink full of dishes, and a kite full of wind
I pound another nail in the cross, every time I sin

    
Chorus

     I stacked the wood pile, I spread the straw
     I butchered our last chicken  
     Pulled the dead tooth from my jaw

Like a song that’s been forgotten, like a key that’s been lost
Every single flower died, in last night’s hard frost
So stack up all your kisses, and melt away like a bar of soap
Baby you’ll know where to find me, right at the end of my rope

Chorus

Yes this ship it is sinking, and the sky is caving in
But our hearts go right on beating while the snow is blowing in
Grab your winter coat and throw your o’l dice away
Cause the storm clouds are gathering, it looks like judgement day

Chorus

Now I am crying, ‘cause I know I am lost
My heart’s black as a crow, and I know how much my sin cost
So make me a bed of oak leaves, that I can sink down in
My heart is the cushion, and  you are my pin

Comments

[scott warren/analog mutant]

awesome post! i would love to hear the song. And the picture is priceless... so real and raw and a little sad