Horror movie with chicken

Chicken caught in your main beams
at the side of a country road,
late at night with jazz on the radio
and tiredness setting in…
you wouldn’t give it a second thought
except it was wearing shades
and a leather jacket.
                                        Wearing shades.
At night.
                        And as you ease off
to take that sharp curve, it’s there —
in the middle of the road — the same chicken,
though God knows how it moved
so fast, how it got in front of you.
The steering wheel wrenches itself
from your hands. The brake’s been cut.
The treeline strides forward to meet you.


Neil Fulwood (UK)