For The Pumpkins

Oh, fun – a dead chicken. It’s one of the Featherfeets, splayed out under the nest boxes, her little chicken beak open in that last gasp exasperation. Eyes rolled back. Her feathered claws released in defeat. Her clutch on life has been let go. Chickens just die sometimes. Poor thing. I pick her up by her feathered feet (hence her name), slate and dirty white feathers hanging. Off to Wilder Lane – the path between the pasture and logging road – we go. There’s a berm there, filled with woodbine, blackberry, and garlic mustard. It’s also filled with sheep and chicken bones – and other mysterious things I’ve buried over the years. The previous owners of this farm property kept a compost pile back here. In 2018 when we moved here, I spied a humongous volunteer zucchini growing from the berm. I harvested it right before the Sandwich Fair.

A few years later, we brought some sheep onto the land. Romneys – three lambs and three ewes. One of the old mamas, Kiriava, was scrawny and unhappy and she never quite settled in. She liked to pretend to die. I’d drag her around by her front legs. It was comical, but I knew it wasn’t good. We were warned by the seller of the lambs that she might just up and die one day. Not too long after, she keeled over and never recovered. If this was a game of Clue, it would be Farmer Rich with the .22 long rifle and the kitchen knife, in the shadow of the barn. It was the height of July and I battled the flies while butchering her up in the pasture. The first animal I killed. I cried a bit, by myself, alone, out there in the sun. A few leg roasts went into the freezer. I buried the rest of Kiriava in the berm on Wilder Lane.

Over the years, a few chickens died – Rhode Island Reds and Golden Comets, mostly – and they found their way to the berm. The garlic mustards come up every spring. The self-heal and the violets spread off the slopes. Blackberries make themselves known, now and then. Firewood piles buffer the berms. The sun creeps in a bit more every year as I clear trees. I can hear the nearby Bearcamp River crashing over rocks. Sometimes I want to sneak behind the cabin the woods next door and take a dip.

Zucchini <3

The leader of the Romney sheep was Roxy – a tough old auntie sheep, as none of the lambs were hers. She taught them how to paw the gate, and get the good corn when I tossed it to them. Classic auntie behavior. The matriarch, Emelda, taught Clover, Aster, and Mittens how to be good-mannered sheep ladies. But Roxy was a wild girl. Clover, especially, took notes from Roxy. She combined the leadership of Roxy with the class of her mother, Emelda. I knew Clover would be the leader of the flock one day.

One day, out of the blue, in November of 2024, Roxy didn’t want to go out to the pasture. The four sheep galloped off to their paddock, and Roxy stopped halfway. She stared at me with a lost look. It got weird. I called out of work. I led her back to the barn. Everyone followed. I called the Sandwich Animal Hospital – Adrian and Casey were on a trip in NYC but took some time to text advice to me via the office. Roxy didn’t have a fever. A fecal test (a few days later) reported nothing but normal sheep poop. I sat with her as she died – it was quick and sudden. Those last gasps of a living creature are heart-breaking. I wiped drool from her mouth and closed her sheep eyes. Sheep just die sometimes.

I sobbed. I was going through a divorce at the time and this was the first time I actually cried. The release the universe finally let me have. I heaved and gasped. Goddamn. I let the other sheep sniff her dead body and let them out to pasture. They galloped out like it was just another morning. Sheep move on. I did, too.

I dug a hole in the berm on Wilder Lane and laid Roxy inside. I removed her ear tag and shoveled dirt around her. I keep her ear tag with my “natural history museum” collection on my old desk. A buffalo horn. Roo’s spur. A bluejay feather. A seashell from Hampton Beach. A woodbine wreath. A rock from the summit of Mt. Jefferson. Pine cones. Spruce cones. The old Coleman lantern. Y’know, the things we collect over time….

Every year in North Sandwich, folks line up their jack-o-lanterns at Remick park. The spooky silly carvings line the stone wall at the all October – then in November, they’re free for the taking and I’ll show up at midnight and make a few dozen orange ghosts into sheep snacks. Sheep love pumpkins and will nibble on them all day long. Chickens love pumpkins too. While I buried Roxy, I thought of the zucchini from years ago. I decided to plant pumpkins here to honor her and Kiriava and all the chickens.... and all those other mysterious things I've buried here over the years.

What I didn’t expect was to spend early 2025 house-shopping. Well, I was cabin-shopping. Yurt-site shopping. A hillside from which I might carve out a hobbit hole. I even considered renting a dog-friendly apartment. Nothing beats owning a nasty old homestead. That is where freedom lies. I took the spring off from farming and gave the sheep away, gave the chickens away, gave the potatoes away. Divorce stuff. By June, I decided to stay. I planted corn, green beans, and kale. By October, I had chicks again. I mowed the fields, I chopped firewood. I stared down the dusk from the roadside. When you give, you get. A flock of chickens appeared in my barn like magic. Bags of corn and kale kept my winter belly full. Stewardship makes us feel whole.

Roxy <3

And here we are, staring down the dead Featherfeet in the coop, laid beneath the nest box in her wrangled mess. A dead chicken. She’s just an omen for the times to come. I’m dealing with some Egg Killers. I have Biter and Egger in chicken jail. They are fine birds, but they eat eggs. Biter finds herself in the killing cone. I slice her throat and hold her head back so she’s dead in less than a minute. A final choke and it’s time to dip her in the hot water. Pluck, pluck, pluck. Suddenly she looks mighty delicious. That yellow fat of the stewing hen.... She weighs over five pounds and hasn’t laid an egg in forever. Worth it. Egger will have a happier fate – at her new home with the Chocorua Chicks, where a more free-range life will suit her. A bunch of my hens have landed at Kerryn’s place. You’ll find her eggs for sale at the Tamworth Bakery in custom-painted cartons she decorates with her boys. They’re the best eggs east of the Bearcamp River.

Featherfeet goes into the berm. “For the pumpkins,” I say. I owe Roxy. I have kale and lettuce starts ready to go in the garden. I have peas and arugula and spinach in the ground. I start around 75 pumpkin, delicata, spaghetti, and honeynut squash seeds. Some of those will go into the berm.

While cleaning out the barn, I find 14 eggs I never knew were laid by rogue chickens. I dare not crack them. I have made this mistake before. I carefully carry them to the berm. A few kicks of the spade and they are buried. “For the pumpkins,” I say. My new motto. I imagine the pumpkin roots feeding off the eggs, sucking those vitamins and minerals up into their orange flesh. Growing James and the Giant Peach-sized pumpkins.

When I butcher Biter, her guts and feathers land into a big bowl. I bury them in the berm. “For the pumpkins,” I whisper in the dusk.

Wilder scratches around the pile, his breath chicken-feet fresh. I’ve just fed the dogs Biter’s feet. A ritual on our farm. I get the bird; the dogs get the feet. Wilder doesn’t even care that this little alley on the farm is named after him (and Rose Wilder Lane, his namesake). He just wants more chicken-flavored snacks. Pip rolls around in some burdocks – he cares not a lick for the chickens, and even less of a lick for whatever Wilder is named after.

Pip bounds off and I follow. Into the dusky pastures. Magic and wonder into the something wilds. Wilder lolly gags behind us, his tongue wagging. Pipkin is named after a rabbit. And rabbits like to lead you down rabbit holes. And out of those rabbit holes – sometimes – grow pumpkins.