After our 3rd 16-hour shift we skipped down the gravel road in the 4 am dusk holding still numb hands
hysterically laughing about a snowman made of ****** fish ice and decorated with intestines
to our room of splintered walls and sand infused beds.

Drunk on sleep deprivation and the movement of the conveyor belts
Fiona demanded of the 4 am twilight that our work be easier tomorrow
I told her that tomorrow could always be the hardest
she told me that I’m Eeyore because my contemplation always looks a bit like pessimism.

A week later I stuck my finger in the pus filled lesion of a salmon
and worried that I wasn’t existing well enough
I asked Fiona if she thought we were more ourselves dressed in layers of sleep deprivation
She cut 3 tails and stated that we must experience more life when we’re awake for 18 hours a day.

This place had forced the clean carefully constructed versions of ourselves to collapse
but she didn’t want this coarse damp translation of humanity to be what we intrinsically are.

Water and pink slime slid down my rain gear as I processed her words and the fillets sliding by
60 salmon later she spoke again
“You said once that every person you meet has some sort of impact on your life.
Maybe you’re always you but never the you that you were before this moment
because who we are is infinitely changing
we won’t always be grime.”