a chicken and a duck for dinner

The chicken is for me.

The duck is for ned.


I can eat a whole chicken when I'm really hungry, and wash it down with cold Coca Cola or Chinese beer.

The first time I ate a whole roasted chicken with it's head still on, I felt a little sad. It felt too real to me, like I could imagine it strutting around and pecking at the ground, and that it had feathers that came out of its pimpled flesh. With a head, it felt too alive to eat.

My students tell me the head and feet are the best parts. They sell chicken feet at the supermarket in air-tight packages seasoned in Chile and spice, and I see kids on the street nibbling on them like they are carrots or Cheetos.

I'm not quite there yet. I'm an American. I'm used to having my chicken heads and feet chopped off in processing, and my meat packaged neatly in neatly packaged cubes.

All my life I have viewed meat as coming from meat, not from animals.

Seeing a chicken in its whole chicken form is an awakening.

I am hungry and the chicken is roasted and warm.
I thank the animal for giving its life, (as my dad sometimes says)
and although I am still not brave enough to chew on the neck or head,
I enjoy the body of the chicken, devour the meat, and let the energy from the chicken
turn into energy into my

bold

beating

miraculous

body.