London Pigeon Love

Pigeon Patterns

On the steps they are building a life out of crumbs,
Little piles of our discarded food turned to monuments.
Around the Starbucks morning stall, with its electric hums,
They gather us up, to herd us in some absurd grey waltz.

They seem so trite, so decadent,
Clutched like aristocrats with one good, faded coat
Scrounging beneath banks and out-door restaurants.
We raise a shoe to feather the air. Dust particles, like dollars, float.

When you think about it, maybe we would do better
To make a ceremony out of ordinary acts, to tap everyday trails.
Catching the train would be much more exciting if we all spread
Our smiles as pigeons wave their ice-cream wafer tails.
Those pointless bills.

L.E.Harris

Among the rows of adverts that line the tops of tube carriages are a few poems. TfL is such an amazing group; they own the copyright to the real Gill Sans, Johnston, and they give poems and buskers a subterranean stage, and dedicate entire stations to art. Someone figured out a long time ago how great an opportunity the Underground system is for creating a third space, and its an attraction in and of itself.

The programme* which features the poetry is called Poems on the Underground and its been in existence since 1986. I would get really excited when I saw them between Virgin and O2 Mobile ads, rushing forward to look at them up close. There's a line in a poem about the variety of riders on these trains, Tourists sit bolt upright/Trusting in nothing, that I don't quite identify with. I gave up on being cautious and threw myself head first into whatever it is London has to offer, even if it means crawling over pink-shirted businessmen to squint at Chaucer and giggle about pigeons.

* That's how they spell it.