Cathedral

The ionic columns hold nothing up

Not the twin cupolas that welcomed mariners to Port-au-Prince

Not the grand round windows of stained-glass ikons

Not the novenas of those who died in the fallen girders,

Unless you count the blue dome of vacant air

The ruined, ruined facades

The hovering stench —

Has Boukman triumphed?

Do Legba and Ghede aka Baron Samedi mount the buried altars?

Does Ogoun lie entombed in this broken peristyle?

Do these curious questions matter to the houngan

Crying down the mess of fallen masonry

To touch his daughter’s ears?—

Outside the shattered cathedral

The women kneeling in the dust

Raise rosaries to the familiar Haitian sky

And lift their psalms

Past the ionic columns

That hold nothing up.

(c) Photo by Shaul Schwarz/Reportage by Getty Images.

(c) John Robert Lee