There it was, in Southampton,
dominating Main Street,
The Oldest Presbyterian Church in America,
its posture stiff and angular
in upright dignity,
preaching austerity
now and forever?
pure white, by clear design.

The Oldest Presbyterian Church in America,
attended by
the oldest Presbyterians in America,
tight-lipped and thin,
well over a hundred,
somberly entering
and somberly returning
to the day’s renunciations.

They are long-lived because virtuous,
virtuous because never debauched
by those raucous Italians
waving an enormous statue
on the feast of Saint Theresa,
a baroque procession
with candles, incense, and song?
as if heaven were here on earth,
as if faith were a carnival.

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