From issue 03 of To The People, a zine by YTTP Studios
Becoming
by Tyris Winter
When i came back from utah
My first act of self care
after rolling my suitcase into my bedroom
Was to wash my face
Cleanse the dead skin
Lose entire states
Watch miles twirl down the drain
as they resembled mountains,
Windows cracked on the highways at daybreak,
a gas station full of strangers in nevada
their exhales clinged to my pores
Their shed skin lived in the bed of my lungs
DNA caught in peripheral
lifelines lapsed in breeze
and all I can think about is the release
the exhales it takes to forget
how I won’t even remember the interactions that changed me
but I’ll know the feeling
the stomach sore from laughter
eyes quick for a dramatic roll
How the life of each conversation relies on the response
the life of me depends on how I breathe
If I can hold onto someone’s past long enough
for it to become mine
Each encounter will flow through my veins,
And since the brain needs oxygen,
then every person I’ve breathed around is now a cell ill use
meaning all the thoughts I know are not my own,
Meaning everyone I’ve met is crucial for my existence
the skin is constantly rebirthing itself in order to survive
My skin is made new once it has used the old
How I must carry the dead even in small fragments
Though eventually when enough time passes the lost cells will fill my lungs whole
And my vessel will tend the soil fertile and give way to another life
Meaning what has once passed will soon be
air,
What has once passed will soon be
Oxygen,
wind,
molecules sparking discovery,
Moments spent becoming..