The Eternal is Great, But the White Man is Even Greater, Haiti My Love!
By La Rédaction · Port-au-Prince
· 2 min read · Updated 24 April 2026
Translated from French — AI-assisted and reviewed by the editorial team. The French version is authoritative. Read the original · About our translation policy
The Eternal is great, they say.
But the White man is even greater. And Haiti, my love, sinks into the shit with a silent, almost resigned dignity. News from the country reaches me like a heavy, sticky, obscene rumor. They no longer announce pain: they exhibit it. Every day. At a fixed hour. Like an unhealthy ritual. The Miami Herald journalist spoke of a 'disease that does not yet have a name'. She is right. But she forgets the essential: Haiti is no longer for Haiti. It has become a showcase of its own agony, a stage without wings, a country where even shame has deserted. Yet there was a people. Docile, they say, I say patient. A people who wanted to live with their history, their whims, their tales. A people who asked for little: corn, yams, a few tangerines for the children, a pot of rice when the earth consented to drink. Nothing glorious. Nothing spectacular. Just enough to stay standing. Today, we are promised a minimum of security. The White man, greater than the Eternal, grants it to us on condition that we say thank you. I think... yes, I think we should say thank you. Even when gratitude tastes of fear. Even when it is obtained on our knees. My uncle Liserè called me this morning. His voice trembled less from anger than from hunger. He hasn't eaten since yesterday. The roads are blocked. The pâté vendor hasn't come by. His son, enlisted in the 'abolotcho' trade, received a bullet instead of food. Here, bullets feed more surely than fields. I reread Jean-Marie Théodat, through a text by Daniel. Haiti, my love, he says. He is a geographer. But in the country, we no longer need maps. We know every dead end, every barricade, every improvised grave. The territory is now inscribed in the flesh. And yet... Haiti still breathes. Poorly. Askew. But it breathes. In the silence of a phone call. In an empty pot that waits. In a people who no longer have words but who hold on. The Eternal is great. The White man is greater, perhaps. But somewhere, very low, very humble, an island continues to love, and perhaps that is the last scandal! Yo di baron se lwa ey!
E m konnen baron se lwa! Yves Lafortune, Miami
But the White man is even greater. And Haiti, my love, sinks into the shit with a silent, almost resigned dignity. News from the country reaches me like a heavy, sticky, obscene rumor. They no longer announce pain: they exhibit it. Every day. At a fixed hour. Like an unhealthy ritual. The Miami Herald journalist spoke of a 'disease that does not yet have a name'. She is right. But she forgets the essential: Haiti is no longer for Haiti. It has become a showcase of its own agony, a stage without wings, a country where even shame has deserted. Yet there was a people. Docile, they say, I say patient. A people who wanted to live with their history, their whims, their tales. A people who asked for little: corn, yams, a few tangerines for the children, a pot of rice when the earth consented to drink. Nothing glorious. Nothing spectacular. Just enough to stay standing. Today, we are promised a minimum of security. The White man, greater than the Eternal, grants it to us on condition that we say thank you. I think... yes, I think we should say thank you. Even when gratitude tastes of fear. Even when it is obtained on our knees. My uncle Liserè called me this morning. His voice trembled less from anger than from hunger. He hasn't eaten since yesterday. The roads are blocked. The pâté vendor hasn't come by. His son, enlisted in the 'abolotcho' trade, received a bullet instead of food. Here, bullets feed more surely than fields. I reread Jean-Marie Théodat, through a text by Daniel. Haiti, my love, he says. He is a geographer. But in the country, we no longer need maps. We know every dead end, every barricade, every improvised grave. The territory is now inscribed in the flesh. And yet... Haiti still breathes. Poorly. Askew. But it breathes. In the silence of a phone call. In an empty pot that waits. In a people who no longer have words but who hold on. The Eternal is great. The White man is greater, perhaps. But somewhere, very low, very humble, an island continues to love, and perhaps that is the last scandal! Yo di baron se lwa ey!
E m konnen baron se lwa! Yves Lafortune, Miami
