Catch that Pigeon

[nibbed]

Hi Keith, I liked your poem. I don't know why it is being buried, though. It deserves more notice.


I used to feel as smart
as a done up top button,
always sat up straight
for the spare milk.                                    i REALLY liked these first four lines
But collars get tighter,                              i wondered if collars referred to the costliness of organized religion
long days turn quietly into nights,            this indicates the typical life
bath-times fall flat and tepid,                     wondering if the last two in this S refer to children grown or no children
bed-times read by themselves.

I exaggerated my responsibilities,             wasn't honest maybe
the fountain of all knowledge,                   the internet, this is where I get tangled
drank my youth without immortality,       drank, gulped & fountain
gulped down from the hard worker's
poison challis.                                            coffee

So now they ask and I tell them,
they ask again so I show them.                they is the mystery, unless you refer to people watching or curious
Each day my pigeon flies out the window  pigeons are gentle.
and returns with messages.
So I sit in the dark and read them,
I pick up my phone and I leave them,
I feed him each day with dry crumbs
and look out across the city.                      he is well fed

He tells me what it's like,
what he's seen, the sights
beneath the freedom of tired flight          
out over the skyline, down the tracks      
into the country, washing high
over the coast, taking time to rest.

I turn off my desk lamp,
lock some papers in the drawer
and hope that one day he wont come back.  maybe he hopes, too. maybe it's instinct that brings him back.
                                                            


I like pigeons okay, until they poop where it's not good, and then I don't like them...but only for awhile. I think they are enough the same as doves. Gentle, but sometimes you get those tough ones from the city that accidentally ate a cigarette butt and they are more ruffled and grouchy, though still lovely and soft because they are, afterall, pigeons. Maybe pigeons are more like a dove that didn't have a bath in long time, or never had a bath, because people don't put out birdbaths like they once did. When I was 5 or 6 my brother taught me to make dove calls. He taught me to cup my hands just so and bend my thumbs and blow at just the perfect angle, and it sounds just like a dove! Sometimes if I am riding my bike and I see a dove on a wire I will stop and talk to him. And he will turn his head or blink, seems he's curious as how this big ugly human can do that, and I make a friend. He never flies away, it's me that leaves. He stays there and watches me pedal away not knowing a bit how I am smiling or crying and remembering my brother.

You have given me a blessing, but that is your gift, the gift you have.
Thank you for sharing.

janine