I swear to hold the lamp at the end
of the tunnel. I would walk along the prairie
at midnight as the sky falls
if it means leaving the city that haunts
everyone who wears the hue of my skin.
I promise to write to Lucia
from my past. I promise to wait for her
in the future. At the mailing room,
I search the handwriting of my friends.
I have given up on sainthood, on priesthood.
In America, I slept inside the body
of a painter. The next morning, the sunlight  
from the window nudged us awake.
& it was not a premonition.
Even the stars nestled in my eyes are flying
to strange lands. The beatbox stops working
just before I made it to the mountains.
I will carry a camera with me into the haze
to capture the voices of men
walking with a song curled around their necks.
Nothing is going to change. Not my voice,
not the glint of dirge that spills from it.
I will build an ark, name it after Lucia.
I will tend a garden, invite my griefs to sit
amongst the green of God’s work.
I will take my gods to the river. I won’t drown
them. I will show them the vanity of thirst.
I will stretch my hand out in the haze.
I will do this despite of, in spite of, the ache.
I swear to hold a lamp at the end of the tunnel.
& I promise to sing a song while at it.