sad news from the animal kingdom

Sad news from Compton Avenue today, as my friend Ali has had to report that Cyril, her favourite seagull, bought it yesterday. Cyril was a good seagull - just a nipper in many ways but wise beyond his years. In troubled times he sought wise counsel from Ali and she in turn learned a good deal from her flappy companion. She is the only person I know, for example - apart from Sam - who can spot and swoop on a discarded chip from forty paces. While myself and Ali have penned tributes to this marvellous bird (reproduced below) I ask that you give Ali time to grieve and respect her quiet dignity at this difficult time.

An earlier tribute to Cyril the seagull can be found at the bottom of the comments, here.

Myself and Ali in happier days, and a seagull, yesterday.

ode to cyril, by Ali

you were born, a fluffy ball of grey
you lived on the roof next door
you grew and grew with each passing day
you flapped your wings and sang your songs
mostly in the morning about 5am
i watched you proudly from my window

then one day the news came
you were gone
your fluffy feathers no more
your song never to be heard
your wings never to spread

rest in peace cyril.

rest assured we will find the motherf**ker who ran you down and tear him limb from limb

Cyril, Ascending by Jonathan

you were the world of blogging's most famous
and singular seagull. Little more than a gull-child,
your pencil grey feathers and hesitant take-off
seeming somehow to stand for life in a world
which is savage and wild.

Larus modestus, stood on your perch overlooking
the city, the burger king wrappers and the scent
of the chippy. And pigeons and gulls, oh
they swoop and they sneer when you try to take off
then feel queer, and fall back to the sill feeling dizzy and ill,
flight so far yet so near.

Then the day arrrives. Spurred on by that girl
who each day wills you on - and the smell of kebabs
wafting up from the station - you are launched.
And this time the air wafts you up and you laugh
and you smile and you fly... and you're free at last.

You could fly anywhere, somewhere far somewhere near,
you could take out an infant way down at the pier
and fly off with his ice cream to london, to paris,
and then suddenly near - a toyota yaris!

you have swooped down too low
and the angles are shady,
you think for a moment of your perch,
your sill,
of that beautiful lady,
who watched you and waited, who would be
so proud - and now has to know
that some cunt mowed you down.

Rest in peace Cyril.