Modus Vivendi
When our chickens arrived, you gave them all names:
Lucy, Roberta—the rooster was James.
“They’re French,” I protested. “Shouldn’t they be
Giselle, Bernadette, and Jacques—or Henri?”
When we’d painted the chicken coop, I’d wanted red,
And you’d wanted blue. I’d won. Now you said,
“When we disagreed last time, you got to pick.
So it’s my turn this round, honey. Don’t be a dick.”
We sat down to breakfast. I sighed, “Fair enough.”
(You had an egg, and I had an œuf.)
Brittany Hause lived and worked in Bolivia, the US, and South Korea before moving to the UK to pursue a degree in linguistics. Their poetry has appeared in Rattle‘s Poets Respond, Abyss & Apex, Asimov’s Science Fiction, and elsewhere.