Selima Hill

I appear like a bird from nowhere. I have a new name. I am as clean as a whistle. I beat the buttermilk in big while bowls until it is smooth. I wash the pearly plates under the tap, and fifty canvas bumpers and fifty socks. They drip in the sun below grey mountains like the moon’s.

Each night I lift the children in their sleep and hold out the china pot for them: ‘Wilt thu pissa,...

‘Your uncle’s here!’ my mother called, ‘Are you ready?’ The taxi was waiting to take us to our weekly swimming lessons. I drove through Marylebone like a VIP, my immaculate uncle close beside me, smelling of soap and peppermint ... He crouched on the edge of the pool and shouted ‘One, two!One, two!’as I struggled with the water like a kitten. I kept...

She comes into the garden to take the washing in. She raises her arms

to her husband’s shirts like a worshipper, and then she makes a lovely pile of them.

Wings, sails, copes, you are folded and ready to be ironed ...

And now she stands, becalmed, with the cold washing cradled in her arms.

I am the wife of the man who won first prize. I am not wearing my new shoes which, though smarter, are not as comfortable as these. I must stand well. ‘He’s a very sensitive guy. I’d really like to meet him.’ ‘Yes, he’s obviously been through a lot ...’

Because the paint is spread so thick the paintings look like toast. Shoals of visitors move in and...