There are names I do not speak
in Italiano, così splendido
like the name on Sabatino's lips
when he will need to blame someone
for turning this family into a casket
Even the infants clutch to Mediterranean water
like a mother, they suckle at our
flesh and our heritage
God is found in Sicily in the rocks
and in the streets
and all else is the spoiled meat
layering human bone
like me
They send me velvet necklaces
with the image of the Mother Mary,
and bottles filled with agua
and curses in cards written in the
Italian tongue
How are you your father's daughter?
And I think about the infants
in their prisons, in the
inferno di tutti gli inferni
washing their hands of every sin
too much breast milk, too much weeping
too much sleep, too little praying
the way I lose my
heritage in the loss
of my love for my
padre invisibile
