First

Andrew Davis

When I was a boy, a chicken wandered here. And I brutalized her. The cord from mother’s secondhand curling iron made an easy noose. I was ready. I preyed on her, pausing when her beady eyes ignited, creeping when she fluttered her molting wings.

She would be my first. I pulled her in and felt her delicate bones twist until our eyes popped in unison. I cradled her, gently repositioning her, so I could pick out the parasites underneath her wings. Dirty things. Things that begin small and gorge and multiply and leave things like her limp in ecstasy.