Pearl
You say, ‘Hold on to me,
I don’t want to lose you
in the night.
I keep waking up on my own.’
You push your feet
between my knees,
cling to my neck.
My body doesn’t know
a different shape to sleep in.
I fold around you. Grit in my shell –
wrapped in my soft belly.
Neither of us understands what? –
who? – operates when we’re under.
We both suspect your dad.
Stephanie Limb graduated in English Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Warwick in 2003. She worked as an English teacher in secondary schools for several years. She is now working towards an MA in Creative Writing at the University of Nottingham. She lives in Derbyshire with her husband and two sons.