Francesco Levato is the author of Marginal State (fractaledgepress 2006), a collection of poetry. He is the founder of the Street Level Series, a reading series of poetry that engages social issues, and is the founding editor of the literary journal Ink & Ashes :: a journal of the senses, Some of his work has appeared in Witness: Anthology of Poetry (Serengeti Press); Out of Line; Poets Against the War; Voices in Wartime; Snow Monkey; Poems Niederngasse; and After Hours. His awards include a poetry fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center.
Made in the USA
Candied lips part wordless
like the spindles of her legs, slick
with another's sweat, burdened
by the weight of a belly not her own,
in her head measuring the time
till it ends.
His conquest, like all others,
another stain on the bed, a stain
barely worth the bill pulled
from his wallet, from behind a photo
of the nuclear family smiling,
so secure in themselves, in their position
beside a row of credit cards, a wife,
two kids and dog gathered at his feet,
a pillar of the community.
His skin bright as his teeth, not tinged
by any undertone, not like hers
or the yellowed stars, the promises
of the flag kept outside the factory gate,
in sight but out of reach,
it hung over the doorway
where she applied to work, to live
in America, was painted on the ship
that carried her and countless village girls
to this island protectorate, much smaller
than she imagined a great country to be,
and now here, in the backroom
of some offshore brothel, teasing her
from the background of his photo, sewn
into the label of her panties
thrown on the floor, and printed
on the cardboard coffin of her Barbie doll,
bought with a few nights of pain, whose sweet
expressionless face, whose silence,
is all that is required of her.