Pigeon with Warburtons

dead still

no nervous skull-shakes
or scuttle-pecks

still

hiding in doorway shadows
as sun slides
like a drunkard
down dull bricks

head still

a single slice of bread
hollowed out by hunger

a noose of brown wholemeal
round its stretched neck

still

waiting for the rain
to disintegrate this frame
                                           or
step out
                                           be spotted
by twelve
                dirt yellow
                                hungry beaks



‘Pigeon with Warburtons’ © Lorna Callery. ‘Pigeon with Warburtons’ first published in New Writing Scotland 30, edited by Carl MacDougall and Zoë Strachan (Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 2012). ‘ 
Watch Lorna Callery read her work, including 'Pigeon With Warburtons'.