Well...first off, let me warn you, if you're a very strong chicken lover you may want to stop right here.
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We had to write a ballad for English.
Piano Man by Billy Joel is a perfect example of a ballad.
Actually, as I wrote my ballad, I played each line of this verse at a time and then modeled my line after it...
It's nine o'clock on a Saturday
The Regular crowd shuffles in
There's an old man sitting next to me
Makin' love to his tonic and gin
Without accent marks on my own, though, I can't really explain how it should be pronounced. We were to write the poem in ABCB pattern and use Quatrameter and trimeter...I picked chickens to write about because I wanted to keep it simple and not too in-depth to think about.
It turned out sorta sad and, umm...not so much gruesome as just...disturbing? Maybe. I personally think it's well-written, but it's gonna be really weird to read it aloud to my class....
Oh well. They should know I'm not quite normal by now.
And so, without further ado, my poem...if you want to match the first verse (or whatever verse) of piano man to my poem you'll be able to figure out the accenting...but there's no need. It's fine without it, too.
(Also....I've never had a chicken named Cassidy...and we don't slaughter our chickens (not ourselves, anyway, and we don't eat them) but we did have a chicken die last week. Fiona #1 (#'s 2, 3, and 4 are still alive ;)), rest in peace)
Just step in the mind of a chick a bit
Yes, I do mean a bird
The small, yellow fluffy kind
The ones whose mind’s a bit blurred
Born with so little in their brain
Yet always so full of joy
Not a care to be seen inside of them
Considering that they’ll be destroyed
Their life begins in a hatchery
Where millions like them begin
It’s big and it’s loud and it’s boisterous
They’re each sorted into a bin
One wee little chick named Cassidy
Is put into a crate
Other little birds are with her too
Fulfilling the thing we call fate
Through trucks and planes she’s shipped along
She winds up at a farm in Kentucky
She grows up to become a layer hen
And thanks God that her life is so lucky
A few years pass and her laying slows
She thinks it’s her time to retire
This peaceful thought flees from her mind
When the farmer appears with a desire
He picks her up and carries her out
Of the coop she’s come to love
Her mind’s filled with fear and anxiety
When she finds that she’s not so beloved
They find the stone of no return,
She heard of it time and again
Now Cassidy’s head is on the block
And she wishes she wasn’t a hen
Her short, puny life flashes before her eyes
And she knows life will come to a stop
The blade of the ax flashes quickly down
And Cassidy’s a regular crop.
Such ends the life of a brilliant hen
Her egg laying was so divine
Cassidy’s soul is now in peace
We thank her for being so fine
_____________________________________
We had to write a ballad for English.
Piano Man by Billy Joel is a perfect example of a ballad.
Actually, as I wrote my ballad, I played each line of this verse at a time and then modeled my line after it...
It's nine o'clock on a Saturday
The Regular crowd shuffles in
There's an old man sitting next to me
Makin' love to his tonic and gin
Without accent marks on my own, though, I can't really explain how it should be pronounced. We were to write the poem in ABCB pattern and use Quatrameter and trimeter...I picked chickens to write about because I wanted to keep it simple and not too in-depth to think about.
It turned out sorta sad and, umm...not so much gruesome as just...disturbing? Maybe. I personally think it's well-written, but it's gonna be really weird to read it aloud to my class....
Oh well. They should know I'm not quite normal by now.
And so, without further ado, my poem...if you want to match the first verse (or whatever verse) of piano man to my poem you'll be able to figure out the accenting...but there's no need. It's fine without it, too.
(Also....I've never had a chicken named Cassidy...and we don't slaughter our chickens (not ourselves, anyway, and we don't eat them) but we did have a chicken die last week. Fiona #1 (#'s 2, 3, and 4 are still alive ;)), rest in peace)
Just step in the mind of a chick a bit
Yes, I do mean a bird
The small, yellow fluffy kind
The ones whose mind’s a bit blurred
Born with so little in their brain
Yet always so full of joy
Not a care to be seen inside of them
Considering that they’ll be destroyed
Their life begins in a hatchery
Where millions like them begin
It’s big and it’s loud and it’s boisterous
They’re each sorted into a bin
One wee little chick named Cassidy
Is put into a crate
Other little birds are with her too
Fulfilling the thing we call fate
Through trucks and planes she’s shipped along
She winds up at a farm in Kentucky
She grows up to become a layer hen
And thanks God that her life is so lucky
A few years pass and her laying slows
She thinks it’s her time to retire
This peaceful thought flees from her mind
When the farmer appears with a desire
He picks her up and carries her out
Of the coop she’s come to love
Her mind’s filled with fear and anxiety
When she finds that she’s not so beloved
They find the stone of no return,
She heard of it time and again
Now Cassidy’s head is on the block
And she wishes she wasn’t a hen
Her short, puny life flashes before her eyes
And she knows life will come to a stop
The blade of the ax flashes quickly down
And Cassidy’s a regular crop.
Such ends the life of a brilliant hen
Her egg laying was so divine
Cassidy’s soul is now in peace
We thank her for being so fine
