Postmodern Chicken

Yes, said the chicken--Cogito, ergo sum--
To paraphrase Déscartes, I am my doom
And what my values are, what I must be
Is only relevant to the one that's me
And my significant other--that is all--
Throughout time we argued
About some stable self, some universal truth,
Wasting  our time and our precious youth
On pointless, interminable quests--
I'm a chicken--no more, no less--
I cross these streets sometimes just to digress
From the familiar path that many take--
I am my own truth--I do not fake
Some universal that unites us all--
Christ, Buddha, Krishna, Colonel Sanders, Marx, Warhol
Are all the same in my postmodern mind--
You say you know the truth, but you're blind,
Imprisoned by religious paradigms
And worn-out notions of paradise and hell--
I had erupted long ago from that shell
And saw the world as fluid and diverse--
In my unshackled mind I write my verse,
Rejecting your attempts to classify,
To pigeonhole me into some common group--
Even my very trait of chicken-hood
Has many selves that can't be reconciled--
I may be shy or cocky in your eyes--
But I'm just a chicken--nothing more--
Rejecting someone's hierarchic laws,
Rejecting dogmas, boundaries and wars,
Embracing chaos, anarchy and peace--
I am a chicken, sauntering at ease.
 

                                         December 8, 2003
                                      --Alexander Shaumyan