TE20 Migrant Mosaics

Passport to Here and There

The Shilling and the Princess

Even now, I still remember the pleading bribery in my mother’s eyes as she held out the piece of silver in her palm –

A way figured out of the stress of taking me down to Georgetown

to see the England-princess in my new unfinished dress.

‘Which you prefer? To see the princess or a Whole Shilling for yourself?’ At six years old I took the silver and betrayed the reality of it all – The heaving crowds behind the barricades, the cantering white horses, school children waving little replicas of the British flag (some fainting in the heat I later heard) After she left I headed over to the cakeshop then watched the moon come up like a fairy godmother from behind the darkening trees. Moon casting her mantling spell of silver – making me most decidedly her goddaughter.

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