Originally written 8.15.24 and tinkered with this month. For Beau Sia’s poem prompts (originally posted 4.1.24) for #NaPoWriMo2024. #poemswithbeau. Prompt 10. lifetime work. Vibes from the imagery of Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands, particularly the poem “Letting Go.” Crossposted to IG.

Last edited: 6.9.25

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it is a lifetime’s work to slip out of one skin
and into another, like stepping out on december
31st and coming home to the fresh sheet of
january 1st.

it takes skill to know when irritation and frustration
means your skin has grown too tight, and it is not,
in fact, the fact your coworker couldn’t remember your name,
and most certainly did not read the below email that
unlike his FYP, had all the answers he needed. /
letting go is a skill. if only if it were as easy as
ripping off a shirt and growing muscles beneath the full moon.
no, you must chafe against the restrictions until you
have scraped away the old you, burnt up bits of meat
that cling to moon-white bone.

the feeling of your new skin against the world
makes everything feel new again. ecstatic pain, ecstatic joy.
here is a knife’s edge to split yourself upon, and reach
into your guts and pull forth a new you,
rabbit outta the hat, pull the ocean from your cunt with a fist

settle into a new shape, explore the world again, this time as
a scaled thing – last time with your vestigial gills, next time maybe
with feathers growing from your knuckles
that will remind you that each time you clench your body
and make the punching kind of fist, claws upon your palm,
you could let go. release,
open your flesh to what comes next:
perhaps your fangs will drop, perhaps your feet
will become a deer’s
darting through a forest path,
and perhaps you will open your hand

and fly
to catch the wind