One Long Poem by Joseph A Farina

 

ghosts of water street

 

on hazy summer mornings

we children of the street,  became fishermen

with magnet hooks.

sitting on curbs,

trolling  street sand

for iron filings, that rained down each night

when the foundry purged its stacks

tiny rusted minnows on the end of our fishing strings

our daily catch in seas of core-sand

that discoloured clothes line laundry

drying in the ferrous air.

 

ii

 

the street belonged to us boys

girls were porch bound or in kitchens

under their mothers watchful eyes

for them time was measured  in ironing and washing

for us by the foundry whistle blast

at ten and twelve at two and four- like trained

pigeons we would swoop upon the

exiting smoke and iron-sweat stained

Holmes Foundry workmen

taking their breaks and lunch

begging for their pop bottles

our currency at two cents each

redeemed at Kovacs Corner Store

for jujubes, blackballs and Bazooka Joe gum.

 

iii

 

i had no knowledge of my poverty

until i went to school

my clothes , cleaned and ironed by my mother

were ridiculed by the english boys and girls

they were not of water street - they lived

in huge houses on other streets

with names i did not know

nuns with Madonna names would call attention to me

and a few others as the new eyetalians

telling the snickering class

not to laugh - good catholics were to take pity

on those less fortunate and thus obtain gods blessing

                  

iv                      

 

prayers and reading about dick and jane

prayers and doing arithmetic

prayers and learning history was my

daily curriculum now- recess was a time to

hide in corners and never being chosen

my street waited for the school bell

to release me to its refuge

until my mother called me in

 

our apartment at night was a darkness

reflective of the seasons- cold in winter

thick in summer-the sound of scurrying feet

within walls and under floors-

the smells from the foundry and street

smoke and wet iron always present

holding all of us in its fear and blessing

safe in my first bed, wrapped mummy-like in sheets

i dreamed of an island far away

where my cousins played on beach sand

washed by an ocean i had seen and crossed

but could not remember - an ocean

full of fishes that were flesh : not rust          

 

v

 

my mother takes me shopping on weekends

not to stores but to a field, across the railroad tracks

behind our apartment house- other shoppers were

already there , bent over knives in hand cutting plants

from the ground and putting them in paper grocery bags

my mother begins to gather too as i hold open our bag

she is  harvesting cicoria - sauteed with olive oil

and garlic, placed on her home made bread

became- its fragrance forever mingled on my mothers   

clothes, my comfort as she held me,

singing sicilian songs ,both of us crying:

waiting for my father to come home

 

vi

 

my father bought a radio

an RCA with  Short Wave Band.

he placed it on a chair near the window

and rigged an antenna from scrap wire

out the window onto the roof

he wants to hear italian news and soccer matches

he turns the tuner dial slowly and puts the volume up

i only hear hisses , static ,sounds like ocean waves

as a seashell to your ear

my father says we must be close

the static the sound of the Mediterranean

we listen intently

for italian voices from the electric hiss

securing,  however briefly

a connection to a past grown fabled

with every passing year.

          

vii

 

we were a street of immigrants

all of us sharing the common fear

acceptance came easily

until upward mobility brought

in non-immigrants

they wore neighbours faces

hiding racist hearts

they hated us our working

they hated us our names

there was no honour among them

even though we were as poor

we were to blame for their poverty

what we viewed as our improvement

they viewed as their decline

the street was our deliverance

the street was their damnation

we immigrants the cause 

              

viii

              

the ghosts of water street

are mostly silent now

they used to whisper, show themselves

in empty windows of our old homes

they would call me to return

offering choice fishing spots along the

desolate curbs-  the secrets places where

foundry night watchmen hid boxes of pop bottles

enough to satisfy mine and their hunger

for reliving summer days

of orange crush, kit kat chocolate bars and comic books,

while they absorbed our sorrow

and our joy , faded when our journey

had no further need of them

and families that gathered

dispersed,  denying their

sojourn through this seminal street

that marked us all, with its blessing

and its curse....

Joseph A Farina - is a retired lawyer in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. He is an award winning poet, internationally published in Europe and Middle East. Published in  Quills Canadian Poetry Magazine, Ascent, Subterranean  Blue  and in   The Tower Poetry Magazine, Inscribed, The Windsor Review, Boxcar Poetry Revue, his work also appears in the anthologies  Sweet Lemons: Writings with a Sicilian Accent,  canadian Italians at Table,  Witness  and Tamaracks: Canadian Poetry for the 21st Century.  Published in U.S. magazines Mobius, Pyramid Arts, Arabesques, Fiele-Festa, Philedelphia Poets and  Memoir and in Silver Birch Press  Series. He has had two books of poetry published— The Cancer Chronicles   and  The Ghosts of Water Street and an E-book Sunsets in Black and White and  his latest book, The beach, the street and everything in between.