by Gail White
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| Mon., Aug. 30: Children watch reporters at a building collapse scene in New Orleans. Brandon Bell/Getty Images |
Someday only the divers
will visit New Orleans.
The church bells will ring under water.
Kelp will encircle the rusting wrought iron
like Mardi Gras beads.
The round-eyed fish will roam free
with no one to cook them with almonds.
Drinks are not on the house now, but under the sea.
Politics cause no fights. Who wins doesn’t matter.
The artists are gone. The rich and the homeless are gone.
The old jazz musicians have shut up their instrument cases
I will be one of the few to remember the days
of white-powdered beignets and coffee at Jackson Square,
and Jackson himself on a rearing horse tipping his hat.
And the bells of St. Louis Cathedral
will ring for mass under the sea.
Gail White is a formalist poet and a contributing editor to Light. Her most recent collections are Asperity Street and Catechism. She lives in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, with her husband and cats.