an Ode to Rick James

We suffered an unusually terrible attack on the Chicken Coop yesterday. All pictured above are no longer with us.
I went to tend them after work and found the 2 laying hens either missing or dead, and Rick James, the rooster still alive, but not really. He had been savaged so badly that he couldn't see or move, and was struggling to breath. You could tell he had put up a valiant fight.
I had never been so sad in my life as I was yesterday when I had to tell Jim to get the gun. There was no saving Rick James...

There are 5 of the new spring chicks left, all brown. The one pure white one, Obitz, had been decimated and was laying out back of the coop.
I dutifully scooped up all of the remains and we had a giant funeral pyre for them. There's no easy way to get rid of the carcasses in a more humane way.

The Ode


"Here's to Rick James,
A valiant chap: A Backwards Crow-er.
He was a Good Rooster.
He kept his Bi*ches in line- and in the coop.
He never wore out his pimpin' hand.
He walked the Straight and Narrow Deck Railing.
He'll be missed in the chick yard.
May he get his Cracker Down in the great fluff-butted beyond."