SCREAMS silenced
by gunshots
grow even louder
inside the head.
Uncertain if prayers
will suppress these voices,
if I am still
not too late.
Is there a place
for me
among the innocent?
For this I repent.
Instead of triggers
and dead bodies,
let these fingers
pull the rosary.
Let the tongue confess
the names of sinners,
like how it once sang
to every prayer.
Let the hands clasp
for salvation
the same way
done at gunpoint.
Surrender to faith—
now should be
not the hour
of my death.
