Joe Grieco

Wound Care

Maybe you heard a familiar voice

Sounded just like one of your relatives talking

But really, it’s you talking

In Little Italy, on Mulberry Street, in old New York

Pushcarts haggling, rags for sale

Horse carts hawking olive oil, hey, get it from the barrel, bring your bottle

Zio Francesco, my Uncle Frank

Born before The Great War

On Mulberry Street, before my father and the other five kids

He sent us a big white couch when my father left for Vegas forever

I guess he thought we needed something to sit on

Our mother covered it in plastic that never came off

When he was dying 

He forgot to talk American, he only talked Italian

He didn’t know who I was, or anybody come to visit

But in his last hour, we spoke

From way back on Mulberry Street

Holding my hand from a bed with a plastic sheet that never came off

Spoke about pushcarts, and olive oil

About how grandpa came home drunk

Pulled grandma out of bed by her hair, and scared awake all the kids forever

Maybe sometimes there’s a cadence in my voice

That sounds just like Uncle Frank talking

But see, I don’t understand Italian

See, maybe in my last hour 

I’ll sit on a big white couch and hear what I’ve heard

Talk only in Italian, just like the kids on Mulberry Street