Diana Gittins has moved house sixty-four times but now lives in East Budleigh in Devon.
When not playing the flute, she writes poetry and prose in the company of hens. These poems are directly inspired by those domestic fowls, personable individuals rarely mentioned in literary despatches but here uniquely celebrated.
The pamphlet was reprinted in 2017 in response to popular demand. Chickens are the theme for 21st century poetry.
Sample section from the sequence:
Mabel can do it all by herself
thank you very much
her neatly ordered feathers,
her comb like a tightly wrapped scarf
proclaim
a hen needs a cockerel
like a fish needs a bicycle
but Martha, ensconced in the nesting box
drifts, as the egg tickles her vent
and she shifts, imagining
technicolor plumage, and rustles
for crows and doodle doos
would like to watch him strut
would like to