Neither Seen nor Heard by
Rose Romano
published by malafemmina press, available on Amazon
Neither Seen nor Heard is Rose Romano’s third book of poetry. It includes all of the poems in her first two books, Vendetta and The Wop Factor, plus poems published in literary journals and some never published before. But, while many of these poems would be familiar to people who know her work (which has been taught at universities in the United States and Canada and is included in the collections of many public and university libraries), it’s all new to me.
And I’m stunned by it all. She talks about being an Italian-American in a way that I’ve never seen before and she interweaves her sexuality (she’s a lesbian) with her ethnicity. Although I’m not a lesbian, I’m Italian-American, and I find her work fascinating. I’ve learned a lot about things I should have known about long ago by reading these original and and very strong poems.
One poem, “And She Laughs,” on page 15, in which she talks about a lover who is apparently “pleasingly plump,” includes these lines:
She has thighs
that could hold up
Aphrodite’s temple in
Sicily.
I tell her—dieting
is un-Italian
and she laughs,
choking on her salad.
I didn’t even know Aphrodite had a temple in Sicily!
And she talks about things that other people might not want to hear about.
“Dago Street” describes the lynching of Sicilian-Americans in 1890, alternating between a controlled account of the lynching with a simple explanation of how this lynching still affects Italian-Americans today, even including some experiences in a meeting of lesbians to talk about racism.
She says:
... One [Sicilian] was
shot in the head, his right hand
blown away when he raised it
to defend himself, the top of his
head gone; he waited nine hours
to die. ...
In “Wop Talk”, she mentions just about every problem Italian-Americans have ever had with bigotry and invisibility. She ends it with what seems to me to be a warning to all Italian-Americans:
I remember when I
had this crummy apartment
in a slummy neighborhood
in Brooklyn. The landlord
asked me one day if
I was getting enough
hot water. I said
yeah.
After that
I didn’t get as
much hot water
anymore.
“The Family Dialect” talks about the quincentennial celebrations of Columbus’ “discovery” of America and makes some important points that I’ve never read anywhere else. She mentions the “politically correct” people who protest against the celebrations but have no plans to go back to the countries their grandparents came from and give their place back to the Native-Americans. She also mentions that Columbus was a Jewish Italian, something else I didn’t know before.
But it’s not all depressing. There are poems that celebrate Italian-American culture, describing dinners with the family (Food is mentioned a lot in this book.), how strong and resourceful her grandmother was, and just how good it is to be Italian-American and an Italian-American lesbian in particular.
And there are a couple of poems that don’t mention at all being Italian-American and/or a lesbian.
And a couple of the poems are even funny.
I think this is a really important book and more people should read it—for both pleasure and learning.
published by malafemmina press, available on Amazon
Neither Seen nor Heard is Rose Romano’s third book of poetry. It includes all of the poems in her first two books, Vendetta and The Wop Factor, plus poems published in literary journals and some never published before. But, while many of these poems would be familiar to people who know her work (which has been taught at universities in the United States and Canada and is included in the collections of many public and university libraries), it’s all new to me.
And I’m stunned by it all. She talks about being an Italian-American in a way that I’ve never seen before and she interweaves her sexuality (she’s a lesbian) with her ethnicity. Although I’m not a lesbian, I’m Italian-American, and I find her work fascinating. I’ve learned a lot about things I should have known about long ago by reading these original and and very strong poems.
One poem, “And She Laughs,” on page 15, in which she talks about a lover who is apparently “pleasingly plump,” includes these lines:
She has thighs
that could hold up
Aphrodite’s temple in
Sicily.
I tell her—dieting
is un-Italian
and she laughs,
choking on her salad.
I didn’t even know Aphrodite had a temple in Sicily!
And she talks about things that other people might not want to hear about.
“Dago Street” describes the lynching of Sicilian-Americans in 1890, alternating between a controlled account of the lynching with a simple explanation of how this lynching still affects Italian-Americans today, even including some experiences in a meeting of lesbians to talk about racism.
She says:
... One [Sicilian] was
shot in the head, his right hand
blown away when he raised it
to defend himself, the top of his
head gone; he waited nine hours
to die. ...
In “Wop Talk”, she mentions just about every problem Italian-Americans have ever had with bigotry and invisibility. She ends it with what seems to me to be a warning to all Italian-Americans:
I remember when I
had this crummy apartment
in a slummy neighborhood
in Brooklyn. The landlord
asked me one day if
I was getting enough
hot water. I said
yeah.
After that
I didn’t get as
much hot water
anymore.
“The Family Dialect” talks about the quincentennial celebrations of Columbus’ “discovery” of America and makes some important points that I’ve never read anywhere else. She mentions the “politically correct” people who protest against the celebrations but have no plans to go back to the countries their grandparents came from and give their place back to the Native-Americans. She also mentions that Columbus was a Jewish Italian, something else I didn’t know before.
But it’s not all depressing. There are poems that celebrate Italian-American culture, describing dinners with the family (Food is mentioned a lot in this book.), how strong and resourceful her grandmother was, and just how good it is to be Italian-American and an Italian-American lesbian in particular.
And there are a couple of poems that don’t mention at all being Italian-American and/or a lesbian.
And a couple of the poems are even funny.
I think this is a really important book and more people should read it—for both pleasure and learning.
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