composition pipe gulls

Blackbird, berries and chimney.

The smell of tobacco burning slowly in a pipe greets me as I walk down towards the High Street. I wonder if the man smoking it is enjoying it as much as I enjoy the result of his efforts. In the days when I smoked a pipe I always preferred the smell of the tobacco, raw or smouldering in the bowl, to the act of smoking itself. Keeping the pipe alight might have been an art but it was often more trouble than the pleasure produced was worth. In the same way I often (but not always) find that music overhead is more pleasurable than music intensively listened to. I find myself wondering if other pleasures half encountered, anticipated,  dreamt about  or remembered (a la Proust) may be preferable to their origins.

 I often see sea gulls singly or in groups over Mount Sion and The Grove,  invariably in the same flight line. But never have I seen  one on the ground here. Then I remember that apart from the ocean, gulls love tips, and that the direction they take is towards the refuse tip in the North Farm Industrial Estate where there are delicacies almost as rich  as those found in the sea, and certainly more plentiful.There is nothing for sea gulls in The Grove