The life and times of a cockerel: What a metaphor for men

My people, by which I politically mean my tribe, should thank the heavens that the duty of laying eggs, brooding, presiding over hatching and raising chicks into chicken was given to hens.

Cockerels are the most useless fellows you will ever find. True, they look pretty so they spend their day preening, strutting around and testing their vocal cords.

Who lied to them that we still need them to tell us the time with their “ko-ko-ko- koko-dee!” in this age when nearly every gadget has a clock?

The laggards wake up in the morning and the first thing they do is stretch their pretty feathers then dash after the nearest hen. No romance, no coffee dates, no kisses. Just a marathon and then bang; they get laid.

Incredibly, they have the guts to dance a little ko-ko-ko-koko-dee victory dance after sowing their sorry seed. Then off they go after the next catch. When the hen is laying one of her 20 eggs, the rascals are nowhere in sight.

When the brooding starts, the rascals are nowhere in sight. From my observations, a hen can ‘sit’ on her eggs for as long as three days without a break, only dashing out to spit, grab a quick bite, answer a furtive call of nature then rush back to post.

But the cockerel who put her in the family way is, in the meantime, chewing khat, swapping hen-chasing exploits with his cousins, fighting the cockerel across the fence for no apparent reason and showing off his feathery designer clad and bulging biceps.

You would expect him to hang around, even for old time’s sake, or at least bring her food and water. But wapi! When the chicks hatch, the news finds him madly chasing another wench.

So it falls upon the poor hen to weep over two chicks that succumb to the elements.

By the time the wayward fellow makes his way home in the evening, another three are gone, taken away by the neighbourhood hawk who swoops in arrogantly at midday, having spied, from his lofty perch up in the sky, the good-for-nothing cockerel doing a ko-ko-koko-dee over yet another fallen hen.

Alarmed by mother hen’s screams, he races in too late and shamelessly bellows an impotent war cry as the hawk sails triumphantly into the sky with its frightened prey.

And when the hen asks, “Where were you?” he thunders, while running helplessly around the home, “ko-ko-ko-lioko! Emanyanga enjenda nende bunduuki (how I wish I had come with my gun)!”

The hen always falls for it and in no time, all is forgiven and forgotten. So Jogoo stretches and preens, and raises one leg like a high jumper. He then launches into a spirited marathon that ends with the hen getting mounted against her wishes.

A triumphant “ko-ko-koko-dee” and an egg that needs 21 days of constant brooding is fertilised.

And so it goes, till revered guests arrive and the man of the house asks his wife, “Who shall we slaughter without occasioning massive economic loses?” No prizes for guessing who goes down.