Morte di una donna italiana (Death of an Italianwoman)
A poem by Julia R. DeStefano
After “Death of an Irishwoman” by Michael Hartnett
Morte di una donna italiana (Death of an Italianwoman)
Idiotic in the sense
she expected people to care like her
and thought she could show them
and pagan in the sense
she knew things before they’d happen
but could not foretell of rainbows and sunshine.
She nevertheless had a huge heart
but destined in the end
to be discarded supply.
A meal for a starved ego,
for his soul he never let make
its own decisions.
Shivering outside the shelter
of that heart she believed she’d reside.
Wringing her calloused hands
outside of schoolhouses
they said were sanctuaries,
blind to the fact they could be teeming
with such evil.
You loved her once like they did,
though she counted on your love to be more
and naive in the way
that she still hopes for it.
She was a moonlit stagger by the sea wall.
She was a robe made up of the stars in her head.
She was a heart destined to bleed-out betrayal.
She was a passion never realized.
She was a poem nobody understood
but could if they’d only tried,
then kept reading.
© Julia R. DeStefano
