Wash day
My mum said that we came from a long line of washing,Generations of scrubbers and squeezers, soap and sweat,
Not ashamed to hang their clean linen in a public place.
My mum removed stubborn stains with a carbolic cake,
Then I used the same pink slab to spruce up my black-marbled skin,
'Don't forget to do behind your ears', she would bellow.
My mum swore by Persil, a dandruff-white laundry powder,
She liked the two babies that appeared on the packet,
Said one of them reminded her of me when I was that age.
My mum let me help her peg out the weekly washing,
Allowing me to separate socks and hoist up tea towels,
Pretending to flag a patriotic message to the fleet.
Now, when I take the washing to my ancestral line,
I raise my lavender and coconut scented bed sheets
And wait for the billowing wind to take me back to mum.
Poetry by Christopher Fernie
Read 167 times
Written on 2021-06-17 at 21:12
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