Poem
Mona Arshi
On Ellington Road
On Ellington Road
On Ellington Road
Old man Harvey, with his thick specs and polished shoesshouting trespassers, yet offering us a penny for collecting
his waspy pears.
‘Biji’, looking old in widow-white, whose soft hands were always
stained with turmeric.
The achingly cool white brothers, who lived opposite with their
Mum and spent days fixing their motor-bikes.
Aunty Kamel, knocking on our door, with her black plait undone,
begging us to keep her for the night.
The Aroras, who had a real football pitch at the back of their garden
(Hounslow FC).
Cunny, Pummy, Bally, and Kully (all boys).
The girl next door stealing her dad’s razor and showing me how to shave
my legs with baby oil.
The white-haired lady we called ‘Mum’ at number 4, roaming the
fenceless gardens, until they brought her back in.
Dave, our young lodger, with his paisley cravat, smelling of Brut and he
had a car.
The boys in the gardens interrupting cricket games to scream at the sky
while Concorde flew by. The girls being told off for climbing trees
because ‘it was dangerous for girls’.
Meeting Renu the new bride for my mum’s cousin and being scared
for her as I’d heard about what had happened in the launderette the
year before.
Manjit, aged 9, left in India as a baby arriving back to her parents, her
eyes black with kajal.
Several men from along the road setting up in our garden and building
the extension in just one day.
My dad, insomniac shift-worker, blood-eyed, nursing his head in our tiny
kitchen.
© 2013, Mona Arshi
Mona Arshi
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1970)
Mona Arshi began writing poetry in 2008, after working as a human rights lawyer for Liberty, on high profile judicial review cases. She has spoken of how poetry for her is ‘the polar opposite of writing in a rule-bound legal discourse. Writing poetry involves forging space for creative accidents to emerge. Suspending intentionality means one submits to not knowing where poetry comes from, break...
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Poems of Mona Arshi
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On Ellington Road
Old man Harvey, with his thick specs and polished shoesshouting trespassers, yet offering us a penny for collecting
his waspy pears.
‘Biji’, looking old in widow-white, whose soft hands were always
stained with turmeric.
The achingly cool white brothers, who lived opposite with their
Mum and spent days fixing their motor-bikes.
Aunty Kamel, knocking on our door, with her black plait undone,
begging us to keep her for the night.
The Aroras, who had a real football pitch at the back of their garden
(Hounslow FC).
Cunny, Pummy, Bally, and Kully (all boys).
The girl next door stealing her dad’s razor and showing me how to shave
my legs with baby oil.
The white-haired lady we called ‘Mum’ at number 4, roaming the
fenceless gardens, until they brought her back in.
Dave, our young lodger, with his paisley cravat, smelling of Brut and he
had a car.
The boys in the gardens interrupting cricket games to scream at the sky
while Concorde flew by. The girls being told off for climbing trees
because ‘it was dangerous for girls’.
Meeting Renu the new bride for my mum’s cousin and being scared
for her as I’d heard about what had happened in the launderette the
year before.
Manjit, aged 9, left in India as a baby arriving back to her parents, her
eyes black with kajal.
Several men from along the road setting up in our garden and building
the extension in just one day.
My dad, insomniac shift-worker, blood-eyed, nursing his head in our tiny
kitchen.
On Ellington Road
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