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# Swimming
- URL: https://www.merionwest.com/swimming/
- Published: 2026-02-01T01:54:10.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-30T17:03:54.000Z
- Description: Josje Weusten
- Author: Josje Weusten
- Tags: Poetry, Arts

> The public pool was as familiar

> as the swim wrinkles

> on the soles of her feet

> —since the funeral,

> Mum would take me there

> more than three times a week.

> We’d been there with my older brother

> when Mum would still swim.

> We followed the rule:

> changing, then shower!

> but I stopped racing,

> as it felt like a whim.

> It was busy that day, six weeks in,

> as I got lost amid

> the hands and heads;

> my Mum pulled me up

> —just in time—

> on my swimsuit straps.

### [Josje Weusten](https://josjeweusten.co.uk/?ref=merionwest.com) is a Dutch author and poet writing in English and living in Belgium. She is an alumna of the Faber Academy London [and teaches creative writing at Maastricht University](https://www.maastrichtuniversity.nl/jl-weusten?ref=merionwest.com). She is the winner of the 2025 Short Stories of Belgium Competition. Her debut novel, [*Fake Fish*](https://www.amazon.com/Fake-Fish-Josje-Weusten/dp/1914399501?ref=merionwest.com), has been published by Sparsile Books.