They are taking our roofers
our window washers
our builders
our preschool teachers.
They are killing white women
our poets
our mothers
our neighbors.
In my intestines the knots
have knots.
But last night was the Inauguration
Mass for the new mayor of Nola
beautiful Latina
Helena
and the new City Council:
a white woman
a black woman and
five black men.
In the Cathedral-Basilica of
St. Louis, King of France,
the queen, Irma Thomas sang
How Great Thou Art—I felt it.
We still have street lights
that don’t work, so many,
potholes the size of small lakes
and tremendous inequality
still the knots have let go a bit
and my chest feels a little bigger
to hold my heart.
I heard Kamala Harris and Steve Scalise
were at the inauguration.
And the lion lay down with the lamb.
Peace be with us
and with our Spirit.
Inaugurate that!
Elizabeth Larose is a visual artist from New Orleans with shows worldwide, including in NYC, The San Francisco Bay Area, Istanbul and Cartagena. She has also worked in education, from teaching to administration at international schools in Columbia, India, Turkey, and the U.S. Her poetry has been published in Leas Lit, Resilience in Writing, A Poetry Anthology, and The Ekphrastic Review (as of Jan. 22)
