My first public reading!
Roast Chicken
I cooked a chicken
for my daughter
I cooked a tender chicken
for my daughter
I cooked a tender oozing chicken
for my daughter
I cooked a tender oozing succulent corn-fed
chicken for my daughter
wrapped in bacon
on a nest of onions
with oven-baked, chip-shaped sweet potato
and broccoli, leeks and clean beans
steamed quietly in an upturned
tin tower of holey hats
while she zoom-tutored
and the cats prowled
I cooked a Sunday roast for my daughter
in an oven that takes two to light
We let it rest
for eighteen years
She prised the skin
with bare nails
produced two opals
and handed me one
She crankled black paper
and we ate
The sky is not falling in
and there is oakness in an acorn
Vanessa Raison
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