03. Albion Lorry: 2

He sat in it for hours
the wreck of it
sat inside the fish bowl of the cab
a space, as tight as skull
and let it all sink in, or out
not that he had cared about a hen
with the undercarriage of a sunken ship
fitted-up, with pale pink, pimpled, plastic breasts
and legs and wings.

So many of them hung
stiff from hooks inside the plucking shed
that it was more, of being disparate
or lonely
but he couldn’t think about it then
just thought he knew
that as he watched its crippled gait
the wobbling pad of shitty feathers plastered to its bum
and listened to the tedious, repetitive and painful mew it made
that, for the hen, it would be better to be dead
or was it that he simply couldn’t take
that fucked-up, crippled and untidy world
where no-one gave a shit for Robin Hood?

It wasn’t hard to catch it as it lurched
across the slimy pen
but then there was the shock of heat
from naked flesh where he had gripped
the under surface of its wing.

He knew he’d never break its neck
so held it down instead
beneath the silver surface of the trough where it
just carried on, as helpless as it was in air.

The rising bubbles never seemed to stop
and as it is, when waiting for some temporal event
the time stood still, and death, it seemed, was unaware
of his intent.

It was a test of will.
The bubbles, never ending, issued from its beak
and the red unblinking eye
stared up at him, until
its sodden feathers all adrift, he tossed
its wretched body
back into the pen.