MY GRANDPARENTS TAKE US FROM THE BRONX TO SWIM IN A SALTWATER POOL IN WESTCHESTER
My grandmother is one of the most beautiful women my ten-year-old eyes have
ever lain upon.
With deep inset eyes, a nose like Sofia Loren’s, scalloped nostrils, and billows of
white amassed atop her head.
I listen as she dresses herself in the bedroom, muttering disgust for the looks of
the woman in the mirror.
She shifts her breasts within the cups, runs hands to her hips smoothing bands of
lycra about her waist.
Then she marches with heavy feet to the bathroom.
Before I sit to pee, I peer in the bowl, not flushed, a puff of black hair is afloat on
the surface.
The bends and kinks like mosquito legs, press delicate dimples on the water’s
surface, safe from submersion.
Jessica Femiani’s poems and essays have been published in the Paterson Literary Review, Labor: Studies in Working-Class History, #MeToo, Anch’io, Harpur Palate, Mom Egg Review, and Italian American Review. Finishing Line Press released her chapbook, The American Gun (2024). She lives in Binghamton, New York, and is an adjunct lecturer at SUNY Oneonta, teaching composition and creative writing.
OVUNQUE SIAMO 