Turkeys Observed Heaney provides an object lesson in transposing close observation into verse. Shop-window displays of regulation Christmas fare set up a chain of associations in the poet’s mind leading from the ‘v’ of the Diviner’s hazel stick in the previous poem to the ‘v’ of a turkey’s wishbone! Heaney laments the sorry sight of turkeys slaughtered in cold blood for Man’s Christmas self-indulgence. He describes them blue-breasted, royal in death, lying on show in the butcher’s indifferent mortuary; akin to huge sea creatures or ditched planes, they lie in shop after shop beached bare on the cold marble slabs [...]