NEW YORK— Every morning, just before daybreak, for the past three weeks now, our Queens neighborhood, or our slice of it, has been awakened by two roosters crowing, urging the sun to its daytime duty. Their rousing calls come at regular intervals for the first half of the morning, like an alarm clock set to ring at regular intervals until at last the sleeper, not a little annoyed, is up and about. The duo then often resumes in mid-afternoon. To signal an end to a siesta? Used as I am to the sound, so much a part of growing up in a country where fighting cocks are ubiquitous even in urban areas, I haven’t been put out by the regularity of the barnyard fowl’s notice to the world. But our co-op neighbors for the most part are distressed. To them, these are fowl most unfair, robbing them of much-needed slumber. One tenant declares, “This is New York City, not a farm!” Another believes one of the pair is “retired” and that its owner is Mexican (I’m not sure how he determined this, or if he’s simply indulging in stereotyping). Indeed, this cock’s crowing is on the hoarse side, sounding like he has acid reflux. Yet the middle-aged bantam soldiers on. The other presumably younger one is more vigorous, a full-throated bugler, with subtlety thrown by the wayside. At this point, it isn’t clear if the two are part of the same household.
There has been talk in the building, half in jest, half in earnest, of appointing someone on a stealth mission: to determine where the guilty parties are domiciled and then abducting them. What to do with the fowl subsequently? No one has suggested anything yet, but the only way to enforce the code of omerta would be death. Grilling, steaming, frying, baking? But first, off with their heads!
The rooster with its unique voice plays a significant role in the New Testament. At the outset of his agonizing night in Gethsemane which ends with his arrest by Roman soldiers, Christ tells Peter that before the cock crows the next morning, he will have denied him thrice. Peter responds absolutely not, and yet does go on to deny his Lord exactly as predicted. According to Greek mythology, Alectryon, a young man, was turned into a rooster by Ares, the god of war, for falling asleep and failing to warn him and Aphrodite of Helios the sun god’s approach even as he and Aphrodite were having a go. As a result, the sun god (perhaps Aphrodite didn’t find him to be such a hot lover, after all) catches the two in flagrante delicto. From then on, Alectryon is fated to be the sun’s perpetual herald. Then, of course, there is the sarimanok of Philippine folklore. A favorite motif in Maranao art, the mythical bird holds a fish in its beak. The Maranaos look upon it as a magical creature and harbinger of good fortune, whose call wakes every creature up to start the day afresh. In the Ilokano epic of Lam-ang, one of the hero’s magical pets is a rooster whose crowing at the hero’s death brings him back to life.
In my travels through the Philippine countryside, that predawn call was a regular part of the soundscape, and in places where fighting cocks were abundant, one rooster sounding off was like a call to prayer, for he was soon joined by other roosters, and often by village dogs as well–a rousing congregational hymn to the god of light to come forth. And he always did.
Even in a city such as New York, traces, abundant traces, remain, of the rural and the pastoral. Aside from household pets such as dogs, cats, and hamsters, people keep creatures as ordinary as rabbits and as exotic as pythons and macaws. Squirrels and pigeons are everywhere, and in many parts of the city by the water (of the city’s five boroughs, four are on islands: Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island), seagulls wing it daily. Hawks, possibly of the upper class, have been spotted nesting atop Fifth Avenue penthouses; one couple, presumably former faculty members under a witch’s spell, this past summer built their pied-à-terre right on the balcony of the New York University president’s office. The urban menagerie is said to include alligators; reports of these prowling city sewers and subway tunnels are legion, though no one has, as yet, to my knowledge, actually seen one. (It is possible, of course, the alligator got to him or her first. Before any eyewitness report could be filed). Given the tenor of the times, I think the alligator is also a metaphor for all those buaya in government and especially on Wall Street whose reptilian greed knows no bounds. Alligators are the 1 percent!
The rear-facing apartments in our building have a view of a stand of trees (now in a glorious state of autumnal undress), growing for the most part on vacant lots that separate the row of edifices on our block and those on the next. In spring and summer, squirrels are daily seen, now sprinting across fences and leaping onto tree branches, now being perfectly still, like furry monks. We spotted a hawk once, eating carrion atop one of the branches. In its magisterial presence no other bird dared intrude. We hope to see it back once the weather gets warmer. As for the two roosters, we have no quarrel with them and hope they survive the neighborhood ire. Most likely, though, they will meet their maker sooner rather than later, like their bigger cousin, the turkey, who harbors no thanks and only loathing for the upcoming holiday.