Mother Of Pearl

• Dani Tamlin, Grade 11, Methodist Ladies College
• Poetry
• 2022

Excellence Award in the 'Summertime Fun ONLINE' competition

Mother of pearl, who's secrets do you shine?
From rough shell hewn your beauty lies trapped within.
Bearer of life and heart, tart nectar seeping from salt between your teeth.
Waves froth in your hair, the laced cradle of your arms, veins running gold,
Eyes like thunder shuttling clouds across the barren wastes
Your words escaping with them bloody slash of a mouth clammed shut.
Mother of pearl, tell me—your world is the oyster, what oaths do you hoard?
One day, I pry your stone lips apart you'll whisper what you hold so dear.
Will the ocean ever be enough, Queen of waves?
You cut deep, slicing tongue; rolling over, the tide; sweeping me to rocks
Brine green as envy seeping through your cheeks. You tried to dull my shine;
You could not bear me to glow brighter. Mother of pearl, will you ever answer?
I question love, worth…aught reflects in a stinging eye—lack of word kills.
A bitter mother whose eyes shed not a tear for your daughter's mounting pain
Sits by my cradle, watches, waits, fingers encrusted with salt of my sorrow
Clinging to the fragile hope that I will drown before I grow up.