In a house of wire and measured grain,
Sits the Broiler, lord of
his limited domain.
Water drips at his beak’s lazy call,
Corn rains down without a fall.
No wind tousles his glossy crown,
No hawk dares swoop, no fox bears down.
Fed by the clock, fatted with care,
He grows rich on a diet of coddled despair.
Yet, whispered between his swollen sighs,
Lingers a memory he can’t quite disguise —
Of wings that once might have kissed the skies,
Of fields beyond these measured ties.
Out in the thistle, the Free Range roams,
A vagabond spirit with tattered combs.
Beak to the dirt, toes in the grime,
Earning each seed with sweat and time.
The rain whips raw on his ragged back,
The sun beats harshly on his wandering track.
Each meal a gamble, each dawn a test,
Yet his heart flaps wildly in his feathered chest.
He leaps, he dodges, he clucks in delight —
Alive in the peril, ablaze in the fight.
A feast of freedom, bitter and sweet,
Seasoned with dust, but seasoned completely.
Thus stands the choice in the working pen:
The fattened employee, penned by men,
Or the lean freelancer, scrapping for crumbs,
Dancing to the beats of invisible drums.
One earns a padded, gilded fate,
A calendar packed, a retirement date.
The other, a life of chaos and chance —
But oh, how wide the fields of his dance!
Both mocked by a fate they choose to endure,
Comfort or freedom — never pure.
And whichever you pick, with a laugh or a sigh,
Remember: both chickens are destined to fry.
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