Esteban Rodríguez
LA PALMA
An oasis appears, and you walk toward it,
hoping, that like those narratives of your father
you invented, this is a godsend, that it is meant
as a break from your journey, a chance to strip
off your clothes, bathe in the water, and when
your body has again understood what it means
to heal, sit beneath a palm tree, and forget
the lives you lived before this one: the village
at the edge of a county; the droughts that swelled
the horizon; the awareness that the land
would remain unemployed, and that you,
being the oldest, would have to leave your family,
would have to cross deserts, mountains,
and when the clothes on your back were all
you had left, would still have to take another step,
accept a new faith of uncertainty.