Note: The poet says, "I always think of formal poems as repositories in which I can hide dangerous secrets. This re-formed sonnet, for instance, speaks to the act of self-harm and how it taught my brown, queer body to survive colonization and violence. I wanted a release, an opened door, a river. In writing this poem I was confronted with choices: how much to reveal and how to reveal it. I was determined to write about deep shame. The translating of violence from a father, through religion and the poetic line stirs release as an opening for escape. In childhood I escaped into poetry. This poem is a note to my younger self in which I imagine the relief of a queer life and give my body permission to survive its secrets."