12 April

Roosting Time: A Message From The Chickens

by Jon Katz
There Is A Time

Chickens are not bright, not quick, not smart. Yet they have a message for us, as most animals do.

There is a time,

To stop. To turn off the machines, turn away from the messages. To stop fearing your life.

And hear your life.

To build a boundary, a barrier, between the day and the night.

Between work and our time. Our spark, our story.

Between anger and worry.

And argument and hurt.

Between their news and your news.

That is the message of these simple creatures.

There is a transition between that time and this time.

A time to find our resting place, and close our eyes, and

hear ourselves think and be.

Our time.

12 April

The Spirituality of Chickens: Roosting Feeling

by Jon Katz
Roosting

A bit after dusk, the hens file slowly and in their direct, business-like, pecking way into the barn. They wander to and fro, checking for the last bugs, seeds or meal of the day. Then, within a minute or two of each other, they come over to the roost, hop up and cluck softly, spreading out and finding their own spots, preening, cleaning, their sounds becoming softer, soothing, restful. In the evening now, Maria and I go into the barn and watch this process, which takes about 10 minutes. The new hens are already used to my camera – I show up scattering worms and meal so they get easy with me – and we love to hear these soft and calming sounds of transition, of rest. All of this dancing is done in unison, by instinct, in accordance with some secret signal we do not know. We lock up the roost and the barn and leave and find that this is a restful transition for us, also, from the work day to the quieter and calmer evening.

I’ve  put up a photo album of the roosting feeling on Facebook.

Culture. I am excited to have just bought two tickets to the new Broadway Production of “Death Of A Salesman” starring Philip Seymour Hoffman. We’re going in May, and the set is the same one used when the play opened in 1947. I think this play contains some of the most powerful writing I have ever heard or seen and I cannot imagine a more prescient work. Miller foresaw the corporate destruction of the dignity and security once associated with good work. Willy Loman was a prophet sounding a warning nobody heard.

12 April

The Love Dog Charms Rocky

by Jon Katz
Lenore and Rocky

You have to hand it to the Love Dog, charming a blind 33-year-old pony is not the simplest task for any dog. Lenore is very practiced at dealing with farm animals, and Rocky sensed her, smelled her from a ways off. She sat perfect still as he approached her cautiously (I had been introducing them through the fence.) Lenore is a good readers of animals – she stays well away from Simon, who does not like dogs much. But she locked onto Rocky and waited as he sniffed around her, and then got comfortable with her. After a few minutes, Lenore was sniffing around and Rocky was grazing, a good sign that an equine is relaxed. Lenore is a powerful spirit, love is important work, and she does a lot of it.

12 April

Exclusive!: Author Caught Singing To Donkey

by Jon Katz
Author Caught Singing To Donkey

Exclusive: We caught  author and photographer and blogger Jon Katz singing to a donkey at his upstate New York farm Thursday. Neighbors said it was not the first time. Katz, said the townspeople in Hebron, could often be heard singing to his donkey in the afternoons and evenings, when he snuck into the barn and thought noone was looking or listening. “He says he writes about animals dogs,” chuckled one farmer, “but it seems to us he hangs out with that donkey a lot.”  Our paparazzi were looking and listening.

The photographer wasn’t exactly sure of the song, but she said it sounded like “you light up my life.” Neighbors said they were not surprised. They said the writer was strange, and was sometimes seen crawling around on his belly in the mud photographing chickens while a woman, believed to be an artistic witch, or an art witch, yelled at him to get inside, stop singing to the donkey, and clean his lenses off of the dining room table.  She was seen tossing a camera bag out of the back door of the farmhouse and waving her arms around. When he saw the photographer, Katz ran inside the barn, hid in some hay bales and yelled through the closed door that he was J.D. Salinger reincarnated. We paid $14.00 for this photo.

12 April

Fran In The World: Working Out

by Jon Katz
Working Out

Fran’s first day out in the world with the new chickens is working out. She spends a lot of time in the barn, but the chickens seem to be accepting her – she got whacked around a bit this morning – and she comes out, pecks around for an hour or two, and then heads back into the barn. So this is the way we have decided to leave it, Maria and I, that we have done what we can and not it is up to nature and the ways of chickens. I think it will be fine. So does Maria.

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