by Maya Berardi

sweat drips to mud on the backs of men
in the smoke stack city. men who came as the offspring of
stubborn mountain ranges,
an infertile Irish harvest,
a Polish persecution,
cramping hollow stomachs.
European hills turned them out in waves,
crawling like ants over the salty expanse of the Atlantic
and into our black factories, which they build. they
become.
white bones erect the marble pillars downtown.
knobby knuckles are bridge rivets.
the rivers overflow with red-hot Pinkerton blood.
train tracks lay parallel to water, and I see children playing
between the fences of the two, barefoot, marked with charcoal darkness
under the eyes. They come home under moonlight, illiterate hearts
grinding away in warehouses. I see them
washing on the bank. I hear their shouts. I feel their
cravings.
the mothers bargain too, in severe Slavick vowels
at the Strip District stalls. native languages knot together
into the bakery dough and the sermons and the drunken Monday evenings
of the lower class. on salted meat and prayer,
the women build the families.
cultures seep through the ceilings and floors
of decaying tenement buildings.
all the world in our stinking cellars,
all the power of a city under Carnegie’s gloved hand.
their histories spill from these hovels,
they persist on.
they pervade my Pittsburgh.
they build our people.

Maya Berardi, a Pittsburgh native, is primarily interested in the historical, geographical, and creative aspects of writing. Her work’s been published in the first issues of Large Print, Carnegie Library’s teen literary magazine. She is also the recipient of the 2016 Scholastic Poetry Gold Key Award and two Scholastic Writing Honorable Mentions. She performs spoken word around the city, created an improv poetry business called “On The Spot Poems,” and serves as the Editor-In-Chief for the literary magazine Fragments.