Thanks! I think pigeons are underrated for sure

My favorite thing about this poem is that you’ve chosen to write it about pigeons.

And pigeons are actually really cool and quite underrated as animals.

You did them justice with your prosaic choices

I just saw a couple of pigeons on a ledge in Instabul one day from my hotel room and I was struck with how seemingly foreign their perspectives are to us. They seem so unbothered, yet they obviously aren't. And hey presto, an idea formed. the Ode was gonna be ironic at first, but I like the sincere angle I took with it.

I love how you really me think of a pigeon. I can't remember the last time I sat and thought of one.

You have a way with words to describe the mighty pigeon! I now feel as if we are just clowns and the pigeons sit and preen and judge us as we walk about with clown shoes. I particularly love the last line “ scattered like hungry gods on a ledge of concrete clouds” I am enamored with how succinctly structured this poem is. With every line (I feel) in its correct place. Wonderful poem!

Good points! I love the intentionality behind this!

Thanks for the feedback! The comparison of clowns to pigeons came from the idea that we find pigeons funny and dumb like how we find clowns. I was thinking, the pigeon looks so ridiculous sometimes, would a clown envy their bumbling attention?  Also, characterizing the speaker as the clown is a good way to place the speaker as seeing themself below the mighty pigeon yet acknowledging simultaneously they are worth more than the pigeon to society (like the clown).

God, I love birds. I love that your hyping pigeons in this poem. 

I also like that your last line conveys the emotion of how you relate to pigeons, with wonder and even a level of fear, though you’re addressing them directly. 

I’d take out the repetition of  “with a.” It isn’t an image like “red eyes” so all it’s doing is repeating for repetition’s sake. 

Im curious about your comparison of clowns and pigeons, especially since you also compare them to gods. I like it though.

The power of the pigeon lives in this poem. 

The pigeon makes a steady cameo role as part of the wallpaper in the mind for the city. ... I see and think of them always... and as you ask -- what do they think of us.

Thank you for this --

That's a wonderful compliment, thanks so much!

As a serial bird feeder, I appreciate our enigmatic grey friends getting a shout out. You paint a lovely picture with your words. Highlighting the beauty in the everyday. Like an oil painting of a bleak afternoon on a city street.


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Pigeons. 

Preening powerfully posing, above people's 

Decisions. 

&amp;#x200B;

They make us wonder with their dinosaur feet

They make us laugh with their bright orange beaks

Clowns struggle to imitate the mighty pigeon.

&amp;#x200B;

Red eyes were never so beckoning as yours. 

Red eyes ruled the streets of our time with obsidian pupils. 

We mere mortals never were so bright as you. 

&amp;#x200B;

With a greasy grey color unlike any other, dappled with green scales and black stripes.

With a white softness that occasionally reveals your underbelly. 

With a pigeon above all others to fly above me, what am I then?

&amp;#x200B;

A clown, a mouse, 

A human in a large window looking down at the pigeons

scattered like hungry gods on a ledge of concrete clouds.

&amp;#x200B;

Link 1: [https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/wtbqxm/letter\_to\_redacted/](https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/wtbqxm/letter_to_redacted/)

Link 2: [https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/wtbaos/nerdy\_math\_poem/il33wnp/?context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/wtbaos/nerdy_math_poem/il33wnp/?context=3)

Ode to Pigeons