Monkey, City Palace, Jaipur Poem by Sheena Blackhall

Monkey's bum is pink, shaped like a Yankee doughnut
Plugged with a raisin.
She is the overseer of street pee-ers,
Beggars and barter. Is there a monkey charter?
A union for Simian needs?
Most human of breeds, she sits on the City Palace
A watcher, a scratcher, lean despatcher of fleas.

After the fourteenth tourist snaps her profile
She doubles her hands back, runs the length of the roof
Her suckling infant tugging at her teats,
A small backpacker thumbing a needy lift.