Rainbow Rooster
By Hilda Conkling
An Animal Rights Poem from All-Creatures.org

Rainbow Rooster
By Hilda Conkling

O Rainbow Rooster in your gray coop,
O stately creature with tail-feathers red and blue,
Yellow and black,
A comb gay as a parade
On your head:
Pearl trinkets
On your feet:
The short feathers smooth along your back
Are the dark color of wet rocks,
Or the rippled green of ships
Their sides seen through water.
I don't know how you happened to be made
So proud, so vainglorious,
Wearing your coat of many colors,
Shouting all morning long your crooked song
Loud . . . sharp . . . victorious!

Rooster


Return to: Animal Rights Poetry