Judith Skillman A Glass Chicken Perhaps because it is more artifice than art we are attracted to it, hungry for what it represents— this chicken with a price tag. Appetites being expensive, manners aside, the chicken rules the shop where fluted objets d’art proliferate. This hen is a queen. Never dirty, not in danger— for there are no dogs here. This is a life of privilege. Poverty forgotten, the glass chicken sits in the window. Hollow insides, made in the glory hole, that word obscene, full of connotation. Are we in awe as the fire rages inside the oven where this chicken cooked with no aroma, no gizzard or liver, its substance arcane? Must we admit the muse, a feather plucked and clucked over, a bit of bloodied meat to be chased with its head cut off around the dull yard grown now cold and hard and tough as memory.

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