Interval, with Ghosts of Wounds

As a young man, one of my grandfathers 
went to work as a cook in a hotel built 
in the 1900s. My youngest daughter and I 
stayed there on a visit years ago. It rained 
almost every day. But we had strong 
black coffee and ate breakfasts of fried 
egg and venison or fried egg and smoked 
fish with a relish of onions and tomato
in a room where generals and soldiers
dined during colonial times. 
We walked in the sopping rain—
I wanted to show her the cathedral
where people sheltered during the war;
there had been a crack running all
the way from the door and up the aisle, 
but like any kind of scar, it was hardly 
visible anymore. Even then, it was 
a place mostly full of ghosts for me. 
A statue of the crucified Christ still
lay on its back in a dusty glass case. 
During Lent, they took off the lid and
the faithful could come and touch
their fingers to all the places 
where the wounds would be.