Looking forward to a trip to Sundarbans, to enjoy the quiet and the glimpses of wildlife and birds amongst the mangroves. My favorite is the Jungle Fowl, the ancestor of the modern chicken.

Fowl ancestor

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Jungle fowl calls in strident voice,

demanding sunrise and sunset,

impatiently clicking spurred heels.

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Head held high, voice slicing the sky,

night-dark feathers proudly preened,

gleaming tough metallic tints.

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Boasting of brushes with tigers,

meals of cruel clawed insects,

the salty eyes of long-dead fish.

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Crowing for red revolution,

shouting for pride and jungle-law,

rebellion and rule of the roost.

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But huddled in cages, pale bred to endless appetite for cereals,

panting on fat thighs in sun battered, blood-splattered market places,

his descendants do not hear or heed but stare dead-eyed into nothingness,

boasting only soft white meat and pale efficient feed conversion.

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