It was a hot summer Morning as I sat by the Cathedral, backed by a little patch of grass, over the graves of the worthy - these two hundred years gone.

You hear them on the final approach, that whoof whoof - as in soft feathers beating the air - the delight of childhood with their little ringed ankles and excitement waiting for the eggs to hatch and to see the chicks.

An eye was thus cast in their direction and I remembered handling them and holding them, feet protuding through the fingers, as they nestled, comfortably in the palm of your hand. Hot too, in that higher temperature bird physiology way.

Some call them `feral` and granted they are not the great `flying chicken` of the robust wood pigeon, but delicate rock doves with their own personalities when you get to know them.

The one with no useable feet squatted there, on the grass. Legs stretched forward - useless twisted feet extended. All the other pigeons were waliking and pecking for food, this one had no mobility beyond it`s beak range after landing and it was thinner than the others.

Agile though. just a beat of the wings and it was up and onto a new patch of grass. waiting, as the day passed, for food.

People pass - with their own afflictions - as is the way of life as we know it.

It`s got a life. Able to fly with the flock - drink from the beck and riverside and generally be a bird. It`s disability looked to be longstanding and it got through last Winter..

Fortunate for the discarded chips and burgers then in the precinct - for the individual who perhaps tosses a little corn in it`s direction, daily. Fortunate to be in the City - living it`s own little life - it`s entitlement in the greater scheme of things and for it`s wings.

Swooping now over the City, the bird with no feet.

oilrag