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James with His Prize-Winning Chicken
He smiles into the camera
from a happy moment
in 1953,
where he is
ten and slim
and proud of the ribbon
he won at the fair.
He crouches in a clearing,
by a line of
trees and a pickup,
with the celebrated chicken
perched precariously on his lap.
For an instant,
the
photograph suspends
the white bird's
jerky peck-and-strut,
the swaying tree tops,
the boy about
to stand
into his manhood.
There he will find his new voice,
his place at the steering wheel,
his passion
for men's bodies.
And there, when his neighbors
approve of his poultry
more than his
choice of friends,
he will find
that every prize and compliment
is an opinion about goodness —
and most
won't fit a James
who wants to love chickens
and trucks
and men,
and be happy.
Copyright 1998 by Brian Powers |