The poem "The Yellow Palm" by Welsh poet Robert Minhinnick describes scenes the narrator witnesses as he walks down Palestine Street in Baghdad during the first Gulf War. In 6 stanzas with a repeating refrain, the narrator uses sensory details to depict both violent and peaceful sights - a funeral procession, a bloodied mosque, blind beggars, the Tigris river, a cruise missile, and a child under a palm tree. The poem juxtaposes imagery of war and nature to imply a contradiction between human violence and innocence in the natural world.

1. 'The Yellow Palm'
Robert Minhinnick
Robert Minhinnick is a Welsh poet
and author, born in Neath in
1952. He studied at the University
of Wales, and has won numerous
awards for both his poetry and
novels. He helped to establish
two Welsh environmental
charities and is an environmental
campaigner.
You should compare this
poem with other poems
about the same themes:
causes of conflict: 'Hawk
Roosting’, 'next to of
course god america i’;
division: 'The Right Word’,
'At the Border, 1979'.
Much of Minhinnick’s poetry is rooted in Wales – its
landscapes and communities, people, places and weather,
his family and his childhood. It is not limited to this,
however. He has travelled widely and written on other
subjects, including contemporary political events and
issues. Poems such as ‘The Yellow Palm’ and ‘After the
Stealth Bomber’ reference the first Gulf War and draw on
his visit to Iraq in 1998. Minhinnick won the prestigious
Forward Prize for Best Individual Poem in 1999 for
'Twenty-five Laments for Iraq’.
In a recent interview, Minhinnick said that he does
not intend his poems to have a moral message: ‘I
have a moral standpoint on many aspects of life, but
I wouldn't wish it to intrude too obviously in my
poems, because I simply don't see myself as some
kind of moral arbiter.’ The poet explains that he tries
in his poems to combine drama, colour and texture.
The drama and ‘colour’ is in the narrative and the
images. He says, ‘I think in images and I like to write
in images. That's what writing is all about – the
transforming image that provides even
commonplace things with another dimension.’ He
goes on to explain that ‘texture’ refers to the unique
way a writer uses language – vocabulary, syntax,
patterning and emphasis.
The refrain of ‘The Yellow Palm’ refers to Palestine Street,
but Minhinnick has identified the inspiration for the poem
as a different street in Baghdad called Al-Rasheed Street, a
major thoroughfare in the city and the location of the Al-
Rasheed Hotel, from where CNN broadcast live during the
air strikes on the city during the first Gulf War. Minhinnick
describes the poem as ‘an Audenesque kind of ballad’.

2. The Yellow Palm
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I watched a funeral pass –
all the women waving lilac stems
around a coffin made of glass
and the face of the man who lay within
who had breathed a poison gas.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I heard the call to prayer
and I stopped at the door of the golden mosque
to watch the faithful there
but there was blood on the walls and the muezzin’s eyes
were wild with his despair.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I met two blind beggars
And into their hands I pressed my hands
with a hundred black dinars;
and their salutes were those of the Imperial Guard in the Mother of all Wars.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I smelled the wide Tigris,
the river smell that lifts the air
in a city such as this;
but down on my head fell the barbarian sun
that knows no armistice.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I saw a Cruise missile,
a slow and silver caravan
on its slow and silver mile,
and a beggar child turned up his face
and blessed it with a smile.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
under the yellow palms
I saw their branches hung with yellow dates
all sweeter than salaams,
and when that same child reached up to touch,
the fruit fell in his arms.

3. As I made my way down Palestine Street
I watched a funeral pass –
all the women waving lilac stems
around a coffin made of glass
and the face of the man who lay within
who had breathed a poison gas.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I heard the call to prayer
and I stopped at the door of the golden mosque
to watch the faithful there
but there was blood on the walls and the muezzin’s eyes
were wild with his despair.
‘Palestine Street’ is a major street in
Baghdad (although not the street that
Minhinnick identifies as the inspiration for
his poem), also known as Falastin Street. The
poem describes what the narrator sees as he
walks along a main street in Baghdad. Some
of the scenes the narrator sees as he walks
along the street are violent or distressing,
while others are peaceful and positive.
The Muezzin a person
who calls the faithful to
prayer at mosque.
Repetition of
this phrase
makes him
sound slightly
separate from
everything
going on in
the street as if
he is just an
observer and
not actually
involved.
Repeating the
same first line
in each stanza
emphasises
the narrator's
movement
along the
street using
the personal
pronoun ‘I’.
There is a range of first person
verbs that shows the narrator
using all his senses (what he sees,
(‘watched’) hears, (’heard’)
touches, (‘pressed’), and smells
(‘smelled’) which makes the street
feel real and vibrant.
There is a lot of strong imagery and description in
the poem. The range of colours makes the
description vivid and suggests natural beauty as a
background for human violence and distress. The
narrator sounds detached, as though he's
presenting us with evidence and letting us draw
our own conclusions.
The ‘poison gas’ is a term to describe
chemical weapons such as mustard
gas and chlorine gas. Poison gas was
used by Iraq against Iran during the
Iran–Iraq War and also (allegedly)
against its own Kurdish minority. The
UN supervised the destruction of a
quantity of chemical weapons in Iraq
after the first Gulf War.

4. As I made my way down Palestine Street
I met two blind beggars
And into their hands I pressed my hands
with a hundred black dinars;
and their salutes were those of the Imperial Guard in the Mother of all Wars.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
I smelled the wide Tigris,
the river smell that lifts the air
in a city such as this;
but down on my head fell the barbarian sun
that knows no armistice.
The poem is a first
person ballad.
The 2nd, 4th and
last lines in each
stanza rhyme.
Extending the
rhyme lets the
last two lines act
as a kind of
comment on the
previous
description. They
introduce extra
details that
challenge or
contradict the
images in the
previous four
lines. Each stanza
is linked to the
next through
small
associations. This
emphasises the
idea of a long
street full of
different but
connected things.
The Imperial Guard are the unit of volunteers
(largely) who originally served as Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein’s personal
bodyguard. The unit’s remit broadened into
a wider military one.
‘Mother of all Wars’ (or Mother
of all Battles) is President
Saddam Hussein’s description of
the first Gulf War.
The Tigris is the river
flowing through
Baghdad.An armistice is a situation in
a war where the conflciting
parties agree to stop
fighting even if it is only
temporary.
The word ‘barbarian’ refers to a
brutal and merciless killer.
Minhinnick personifies the sun as
ruthless and suggests even nature
can be in conflict.

5. As I made my way down Palestine Street
I saw a Cruise missile,
a slow and silver caravan
on its slow and silver mile,
and a beggar child turned up his face
and blessed it with a smile.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
under the yellow palms
I saw their branches hung with yellow dates
all sweeter than salaams,
and when that same child reached up to touch,
the fruit fell in his arms.
The narrator implies his
views by observing and
leaving the reader to make
connections between what
he sees and moral and
political ideas. The poem
implies human activity
seems aggressive and
damaging compared to
nature. The narrator finds
contradictions between
the innocence and beauty
of some of the things he
sees and the violence and
pain that human society
has caused. The poet
juxtaposes the image of
the innocent child the
cruise missile to engage
with the reader.
A cruise missile is a guided
missile that can carry
conventional, chemical,
biological or nuclear warheads.
Cruise missiles were used by
both ‘sides’ during the first Gulf
War.
The ‘yellow palm’ refers
to a type of date-
producing palm tree that
is frequently mentioned
in the Qu’ran. The tree’s
leaves, bark and fruit are
used for a variety of
purposes including
timber, rope, food and
fuel.
‘Salaam’ is an Arabic greeting (meaning ‘peace’) which is used
throughout the world, mainly by Muslims. In the Middle East, it
is accompanied by two or three light cheek kisses, usually
between people of the same gender. It is a shortening of As
Salaam Alaykum (peace be upon you).

6. As I made my way down Palestine Street
I saw a Cruise missile,
a slow and silver caravan
on its slow and silver mile,
and a beggar child turned up his face
and blessed it with a smile.
As I made my way down Palestine Street
under the yellow palms
I saw their branches hung with yellow dates
all sweeter than salaams,
and when that same child reached up to touch,
the fruit fell in his arms.
The narrator implies his
views by observing and
leaving the reader to make
connections between what
he sees and moral and
political ideas. The poem
implies human activity
seems aggressive and
damaging compared to
nature. The narrator finds
contradictions between
the innocence and beauty
of some of the things he
sees and the violence and
pain that human society
has caused. The poet
juxtaposes the image of
the innocent child the
cruise missile to engage
with the reader.
A cruise missile is a guided
missile that can carry
conventional, chemical,
biological or nuclear warheads.
Cruise missiles were used by
both ‘sides’ during the first Gulf
War.
The ‘yellow palm’ refers
to a type of date-
producing palm tree that
is frequently mentioned
in the Qu’ran. The tree’s
leaves, bark and fruit are
used for a variety of
purposes including
timber, rope, food and
fuel.
‘Salaam’ is an Arabic greeting (meaning ‘peace’) which is used
throughout the world, mainly by Muslims. In the Middle East, it
is accompanied by two or three light cheek kisses, usually
between people of the same gender. It is a shortening of As
Salaam Alaykum (peace be upon you).