Pigeon Politics

Pigeons have invaded the garden, two then four, then a flock.
They roost in the apple tree to nest, reconnoitre or mate

ignore my sorties to deter them and shit without stint
on patio and herb bed, foul lovely hyssop and thyme.

Their droppings soil plant pots, the al fresco table and chairs
and the crumbling path I must tread to the washing line.

In mating they have no finesse. Coy, the female resists.
The male pecks her then mounts her and is done in a trice.

Puffed up and portly, they waddle yellow-eyed down paths
turning their heads side to side, vigilant garden police

unlike the robin who listens, head cocked, when I greet him,
or the blackbird virtuoso whose arias at sunset entrance.

Even their handsome grey silk with its sheen of purple and green
seems commonplace now, an assertion of the power of the flock

amongst shyer or dowdier birds, nuthatch or sparrow.
Pigeons inspire not joy but a sharp rap on the window.

Sylvia Banham has had poems published most years since 2016 in Ver Poets members’ ten liner pamphlet, occasionally in the Ver annual prize pamphlet and also in their fiftieth and sixtieth anniversary anthologies in 2016 and 2026.