An Italian-American Writer & Poet with a Yankee Outsider Perspective
Late Summer Tears You don’t have to weep with me–not wrenching sobs at any rate, just a slow seep of wet, honoring the clouds of green and scimitars of swallows twittering against high blue. Mornings on the deck with black and … Continued
For five days I’ve been out of contact. Yes, the cell phone rang a few times. And I talked to my daughter who shared a room with me. But I read no newspaper, saw no TV news, checked no email. Instead … Continued
According to Uncle Frankie, fighting with the American 8th Army, surviving malaria in North Africa, working their way up Italy’s boot, slipping Neapolitan whores into American officers’ beds, and falling in love with a New York lawyer attached to Eisenhower’s central staff kept … Continued
I was standing in the shadows of my kitchen, looking out into blazing summer heat. What I saw instead of backyard summer green was the death of elephants. Hundreds of them. I saw the Babar I’d loved as a child, … Continued
Growing up in South Carolina, I had no trouble identifying segregation. Blacks sat at the back of the city bus, whites in front. In dime stores, blacks were not allowed to sit at lunch counters. Super markets were for whites; small corner groceries … Continued
Standing before my huge bathroom mirror, I look beyond my raised arm and find Otricoli, a memory so vivid as to be painted on the opposite wall. “What an odd name,” I said, the first time Pat and Giangi showed … Continued
There are three of them. Three tails and twelve paws to our none and four. When I’m rushing to respond to other humans by phone, written comment, physical interaction, the three of them are a blur and minor rumble–tails around my … Continued
Two things in recent StarTribune articles sent mini-shock waves through my thoughts: first that Enbridge Energy in Calgary wants to add another pipeline to carry oil from the North Dakota tar sands under and near iconic Minnesota bogs and lakes and … Continued
I had a job to do this evening while it was light. Cleaning up a mess, a pile of stems and their roots clogged with dirt, pulled up from a patch of Trout Lilies. I will not tell you where … Continued
It was first my daughter’s when we moved into this tall St. Paul house. One of two rooms on the third floor, it was the one facing south. And until the locust and olive trees grew tall enough for shade, it … Continued