Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100
by Martín Espada

for the 43 members of Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 100, working at the Windows on the World restaurant, who lost their lives in the attack on the World Trade Center

Alabanza. Praise the cook with the shaven head

and a tattoo on his shoulder that said Oye,

a blue-eyed Puerto Rican with people from Fajardo,

the harbor of pirates centuries ago.

Praise the lighthouse in Fajardo, candle

glimmering white to worship the dark saint of the sea.

Alabanza. Praise the cook’s yellow Pirates cap

worn in the name of Roberto Clemente, his plane

that flamed into the ocean loaded with cans for Nicaragua,

for all the mouths chewing the ash of earthquakes.

Alabanza. Praise the kitchen radio, dial clicked

even before the dial on the oven, so that music and Spanish

rose before bread. Praise the bread. Alabanza.

More

More “literature of 9/11,” a course I’m teaching this semester. Sent to me this morning by my friend and colleague Eva Woods.