Ecdysis

I stepped out of the me that had gone and there I was, bare naked and shining. You watched me with your ocean eyes as I shed my skin, sloughing off the past. You walked my boundaries and lit fires around me in the dark, dark nights to keep me safe, then we both waited. And we sang soft songs until the salt water bought the new skin I still wear. It was borne aloft on the undulating black waves, heralded by the gulls cry and the foaming surf. It was new then and radiant, the creases and the scuffs were not manifest. But they were lying in wait, as they always are.