Chicken Chicken #2

            Chapter 27, ‘Hi, Gladys, Gladys, Gladys, Gladys, Gladys’ holds subtle differences from other chapters that create a didactic environment for the reader. Since Walker’s initial shift to a second person point of view directed at her chickens in chapter 9, chapter 27 is one of the first, if not the first, points in the text where Walker leaves out any address to a ‘you’. By removing the frame of dialogue between Walker and her chickens, the reader becomes the projected audience. Additionally, since Walker maintains her references to herself as ‘Mommy’, the relationship between herself and the audience subtly changes so that she is, in a way, adopting the reader. By speaking more directly to the reader, Walker allows for more intimate accessibility of her contemplations, as if she were inviting the reader to think on them as well. Thus, this chapter comes off as more didactic to me than others because of the removal of the framework she created between herself and the chickens.

            Walker’s point that she appears to be teaching is that “[h]umans like to think all humans of another race look alike, but that is because the glance of the uncaring stranger tends to be superficial” (134). Walker goes on to say that despite being unable to differentiate the members of the Gang of Five, “seeing them in all their russet glory always made her feel glad” (134). This concept is a bit complex: Though Walker claims that the inability to tell the difference between members of a separate race is due to apathy and being “superficial”, she also asserts that she, while blending one chicken’s identity with the other, transcends being “uncaring” and “superficial” because of the happiness that they provide her. Perhaps Walker is suggesting that, through allowing the positive associations of people to outweigh the unfamiliarity of them, compassion for other humans and species does not require a full understanding of them but rather an openness to being grateful for their differences and what they provide.

            The form of the chapter reflects the notion of individuality versus communality. Many of the sentences are broken up into short clauses: “Unlike the Barred Rocks with their crisp black-and-white swirls of feathers, or the Ameraucanas with their vivid colors and distinctive designs, the Rhode Island Reds, which is what the gang consisted of, all looked pretty much alike” (133). This sentence, as well as many others in the chapter, are mimetic of Walker’s discussion of groups and individuals. More importantly, it reflects the idea of songs that was mentioned in chapter 20: “we are our songs embodied; it is the song of all of us that keeps our planet balanced” (100), and is again mentioned in chapter 27: “They…respond[ed] with a chorus or two – not quite in the same key – of their own” (134). The short, broken up sentences lend to the rhythm of the piece, acting out the songs of beauty within individuality and communality and the blending of the two.