The Pigeons

On days trapped in a teardrop,
I snap my fingers
to backwoods doo-whop,
but on days when I lack employment
I sit near the back window
and watch the plants grow.
I smoke cigarettes of many variety
and the plants give me the silence I command.
I watch the men of dedication
rush into the bustling sway of capitalism,
dropping pebbles to mark the paths
that they travel from back and forth.
Then I watch all the pigeons s**t constantly
covering the concrete and each pebble,
confusing the masses of men, still dedicated,
but lost in the machine, unguided.
She returned home routinely around 3
and pisses
and moans
and cries that I will never change.
I tell her each day,
"The pigeons make it worthless,
look they just s**t everywhere!"
She just peeled an apple and sat beside me,
rubbing the side of her head.
"Jack," she said,
"Your noon time drunk and days like these
have become the pigeon, to my pebbles of emotions."
I always knew that this day would come.
She finished the apple and walked to the other room.
I lit another cigarette and watched out the window
as another man exited into the street,
looking up at the roost,
and  down towards the ground,
confused.

Reviews

[Alessander]

Really like this. There's a lot of layers here, and can be interpreted in multiple ways.

I guess one could say this is sort of a "social commentary" - and that's part of it. This part reminded me a bit of how Nietzsche viewed Capitalism.

"I watch the men of dedication
rush into the bustling sway of capitalism,

confusing the masses of men, still dedicated,
but lost in the machine, unguided."

I have a poem "Bauhuas"/"Lawnmower" very much in the same vein. However, there is also the psychological angle, in that, the even while the unemployed deems the capitalist "lost, confused" or mechanized, they still have a purpose, and the watcher is somewhat envious, in a disdainful sort of way.

This is the paradox that only an unemployed man can understand.

Then the other character enters, and the plot thickens, so to speak. The social/economic/psychological turns into somewhat of a more domestic dillema, but only the poet and not the historian, economist or politco understand that they're all interrelated in myriad intractable ways.

"you're noon time drunk" says it all. Love that line. It's not so much a condemnation, just an exasperation. Maybe she understands why the person is noon time drunk, maybe not. But the observer in turn becomes part of the problem, part of the white s**t that is everywhere, and unceasing.