THE NEW STYLE AUSTRALIAN EMU
mulga chicks hatch, amongst herbs & sprouts, to grow into gentle
flightless birds, reptilian in origin, browsing & booming, nomadic
wanderers, forced out of their habitat, hunted to the point, where the
sun goes down, even though she lays her ripe green eggs, even though
her oily feathers sweep the twigs, even though the male is proud &
broody around the chicks, his eighteen months of wind & silent sitting,
the emu farm has opened up, eggs are hatched in incubators, chicks are
transferred to heated sheds, parents restricted to pens & runs, their
desert instincts still intact, twelve month old chicks are turned into
breeding stock or slaughtered, with a short barrelled shotgun, fired at
close range, to the top of the neck, the killing of bigness, an awkward
event, emus do not go easily to their deaths, wrestled to the ground, &
kicking out, with strong legs & three toed feet, as we attempt to employ
the free resource, now ninety five percent consumable, we have newly
upgraded the original bush tucker, we have smoked emu at the end of a
gun barrel, fried emu on the plain, toe nails for jewellery & decorations,
steamed emu & macadamia nut sauce for the tourists, live emu exports
to the middle east, emu fat handcream to cure arthritis, emu skins for
handbags & high fashion accessories, we have feathers at ten dollars a
kilo, & claws ripped from the carcass, polished & sold as novelty items,
& carved eggs as souvenirs, the egg sitting father frightened off, the
striped chick yolk draining out, into an emu entree cocktail for two, &
boiled emu in the billy, the billy for one, i won't be joining you |
