Mulberry & Mott Street
by Ray Bianchi


"Scent of their very Bread caused their ire"
NEW YORK TIMES, 1914 talking of the riots of white Americans in New York's
Little Italy and the reactions of the native born who burned the Vesuvio Bakery.


colors and lights
quadrangles and circles
small white windowjambs
that are painted shut now.

yellow paper wrapping sharpened knives
an edge remade
by a man pushing a stone wheel
up and down with his feet

still small voices
sit upon the street
below the din.

the scent of bread, that provoked rebuke
oil filled with light,
and hand made sausage
cut with a sharp knife.

brown and white paper
wrapping familiar perfumes






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