Pigeon post.

this is a very early rough draft. Just notes really.


A song for last year's wife.

This spring

a pigeon scratched a rough nest

on the ledge outside the kitchen window

The ledge where you grew parsley and mint

and the scarlet geranium you nurtured from a cutting

taken on a drunken walk home

from outside the neighbours house.

The pots have gone

the herbs long dead

the geranium fell to the basement last winter

leaving space for the rough nest

in which a pigeon laid a solitary egg

It was not a good nest

I scolded the bird for such slapdash househusbandry

but we watched over that egg

as I fed her seeds and crumbs

and fretted with her.

On the third day

a jackdaw took the egg

there was nothing I nor the pigeon could do

a jackdaw took the egg

save make accusative stares

a jackdaw took the egg

I did not take the egg and I could not save the egg

she did not take the egg and could not save the egg.

but I think we equally cared for that egg

until we decided to blame each other for it's loss.

I have not seen the pigeon since and I have let the pigeon go

but the egg still haunts me.