How to skew element but keep text normal (unskewed)

Is it possible to reproduce this image using only CSS?

I want to apply this to my menu, so the brown background appears on hover instance

I don't know how to do this, I only have;

.menu li a:hover{
     display:block;
     background:#1a0000;
     padding:6px 4px;
}

skew a parent element (LI) and inverse skew it's children elements

nav ul {
  padding: 0;
  display: flex;
  list-style: none;
}
nav li {
  transition: background 0.3s, color 0.3s;
  transform: skew(20deg); /* SKEW */
}

nav li a {
  display: block; /* block or inline-block is needed */
  text-decoration: none;
  padding: 5px 10px;
  font: 30px/1 sans-serif;
  transform: skew(-20deg); /* UNSKEW */
  color: inherit;
}

nav li.active,
nav li:hover {
  background: #000;
  color: #fff;
}

<nav>
  <ul>
    <li><a href="#">Home</a></li>
    <li class="active"><a href="#">Products</a></li>
    <li><a href="#">Contact</a></li>
  </ul>
</nav>

Here is a fiddle for use across different browsers - I created in a couple of minutes.

Try playing with the arguments, I used :before and :after to do this.

https://jsfiddle.net/DTBAE/

You can use the transform: skew(X, Y) property to achieve this. Creating a skewed outer container, then skew the opposite amount on an inner container to skew the text back to being straight. See this fiddle for example;

http://jsfiddle.net/UZ6HL/4/

From what you have said, I believe this is what you want, if not please clarify when the item should display the background.

.skew {
  background: green;
  color: #fff;
  padding: 50px;
  transform: skewX(-7deg);
  font-size: 20px;
  font-weight: 700;
}

.skew p {
  transform: skewX(7deg);
}

<div class="skew">
  <p>This is caption</p>
</div>

Here's an example

To have IE support just add -ms-transform: skew(20deg, 0deg); beside all the other transform: skew(20deg, 0deg);s.

NOTE: SPAN is NOT affected by transform CSS functionality, so you will need a DIV or change span to display: block; otherwise they will NOT be affected.

So just put the TEXT inside a separate div and unskew it.

example wrapper div is:

 transform: skewx(35deg)

but text div is:

transform: skewx(-35deg); 

here is codepen: https://codepen.io/dmitrisan/pen/NWaYEzV

You can use clip-path to make results like these. For example:

* {
  box-sizing: border-box;
}

body {
  padding: 0;
  margin: 0;
}

ul {
  display: flex;
  width: 100%;
  flex-direction: row;
  gap: 20px;
  background: #000;
  padding: 0 10px;
  justify-content: flex-end;
}

li {
  list-style-type: none;
  clip-path: polygon(20% 0%, 100% 0, 80% 100%, 0% 100%);
  background: blue;
  padding: 10px 50px;
}

a {
  color: #fff;
}

<ul>
  <li><a href="">Home</a></li>
  <li><a href="">About</a></li>
</ul>

You can generate your clip from here and use it in your code.

Here is a working Fiddle for reference