Growing with glass · Natalia Zernicka-Glover

Written by Natalia Zernicka-Glover

Artwork by Beca Summers

Growing with glass

A face smushed. Glued, white and pink, against a glass plane You can picture it, right? No Alice in Wonderland nightmare is required To envision the greasy gleam of lightly sebum-coated skin up tight behind a glassy sheen

Perhaps once, as a kid, you pressed yourself against a car window, your mum’s mirror, or the cold milk bottle you brought in from the doorstep.

I certainly did, and I felt the cold-warm – Pure joy. Slightly sticky.

I saw my friend Charli last week. We sat in a pub, hands clasped around deep dark beer bottles. Luke-warm and filled with bubbles.

As we talked about the winter, I firmly pressed my fingertips into the glass. Pushing, peeling, Waiting to see if I’d grown