0 weak, especially in health, and likely to fail or suffer from problems:
Grandad's got a dicky heart.
As rhyming slang the expression has been in use since the late 19th century, but it arose as an elaboration of dicky, which is far older.
They found the address of the local representative, rang him up, took a few details and never heard a dicky-bird.
We have not heard a dicky-bird since then.
We have not heard a dicky bird from it on this subject over the past 18 months.
But they never heard a dicky-bird from the guy who is there to look after the gas consumers' interests.
However, at present the fish farms are in a dicky position, so it may not be quite so necessary.
We have not heard a dicky bird about those proposals since.
If a business cannot stand a year's reduction in its trade, it must be already in a "dicky" state.
