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ODE
TO A TURKEY
When
I was a young turkey, new to the coop,
My big brother Mike
took me out on the stoop,
Then he sat me down, and he spoke
real slow,
And he told me there was something that I had to
know;
His look and his tone I will always remember,
When
he told me of the horrors of..... Black
November;
"Come
about August, now listen to me,
Each day you'll get six
meals instead of just three,
"And soon you'll be thick,
where once you were thin,
And you'll grow a big rubbery
thing under your chin;
"And then one morning, when you're
warm in your bed,
In'll burst the farmer's wife, and hack
off your head;
"Then she'll pluck out all your feathers so
you're bald 'n pink,
And scoop out all your insides and
leave ya lyin' in the sink;
Well,
the rest of his words were too grim to repeat,
I sat on the
stoop like a winged piece of meat,
And decided on the spot
that to avoid being cooked,
I'd have to lay low and remain
overlooked;
I began a new diet of nuts and
granola,
High-roughage salads, juice and diet cola;
And
as they ate pastries, chocolates and grapes,
I stayed in my
room doing Jane Fonda tapes;
I maintained my weight of two
pounds and a half,
And tried not to notice when the bigger
birds laughed;
But 'twas I who was laughing, under my
breath,
As they chomped and they chewed, ever closer to
death;
And sure enough when Black November rolled
around,
I was the last turkey left in the entire
compound;
So
now I'm a pet in the farmer's wife's lap;
I haven't a
worry, so I eat and I nap;
She held me today, while sewing
and humming,
And smiled at me and
said
"Christmas
is coming"
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