Fried Chicken at Dawn

A homeless man eats convenience store fried chicken at dawn from a bench overlooking Coos Bay.

A homeless man discovers a container of convenience store fried chicken at dawn on a sidewalk,

examines it,

sits down on a curb, eats.

A homeless woman carries a drumstick of convenience store fried chicken at dawn in her right hand.

Another drumstick protrudes from a back pocket like a colored comb from the 70s.

Remember when men and women wore them in the back pockets of their flared jeans and never used them?

I count three discarded but not completely empty containers of convenience store fried chicken at dawn during a walk with Elmer to the mudflats. One rests atop a mailbox.

Leftovers for smart crows and meandering humans.

We know where the sustenance will take the crows.

What about the humans?

What’s going on with all this ubiquitous convenience store fried chicken at dawn in my neighborhood?

Marvin Gaye asked something similarin an era

when the red and white bucket of KFC, (original recipe)

with all the fixins,’

Colonel looking on,

served us Friday night dinner during the school year,

when my single mother treated us,

too exhausted after teaching second grade to cook.

The beagle instantly recognized that bucket when she brought it inside

and waited patiently in the basement for skin and gravy.

The recent juxtaposition of fried chickens past and present

deep fry something very portentous inside me,

and elsewhere.