I was a military brat. My return to the U.S. after attending high school in Italy was, well, interesting. Junction City, Kansas was definitely not bella Napoli. This poem came from that experience, albeit a few years after, and was published in the mid-80s in the Allegheny Review, a national journal of undergraduate creative writing, and was republished by Silver Birch Press in 2017. The kid who wrote it still exists. Somewhere.
Letter from Kansas
Caro amico,
Driving the stretch to Junction City,
I look for familiar faces in the cars
we pass, but see only strange grasses
gliding by. Three weeks ago
I slept on a stone-littered hilltop
overlooking the Bay of Naples.
Now the prairie laps at our front door.
A mile from the house two corralled bison
munch dull hay thrown daily
from a truck’s flat bed, and past that
the Discount Center’s sign
spells America. What I wouldn’t give
for a deep draught of Pozzuoli’s
summer stench and the strong
yellow wine that Michele’s father
makes. We mixed it with the gardener’s
red, creating our own bouquet,
remember? And here they say
I’m too young to buy beer and wine.
Without them the food is flavorless,
like the single language spoken.
I understand it all,
and miss the difficulty. Maybe Texas
will be better. Ci vediamo. Bob
This was one of my first posts on the blog, and as you might expect, very few people saw it. I wrote the poem in the summer of 1983, when I was new to poetry, still tentative, exploring. A few weeks later I attempted the sonnet form, and, well, everything changed. Everything.
This speaks clearly to me and captures the difficulty of reentry into the Midwest. I’m from Ohio but currently live in Florida. Going back to the Midwest feels like getting a tepid hug from a former lover. One longs to flee.
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It was a difficult time. But now, 44 years later, I find myself living in the midwest…
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Kansas! I feel ya! having lived here since 2001! 😉
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I would probably enjoy myself more nowadays. But that could be true just about anywhere.
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🙂 As long as you stay safe!
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We’re doing our best!
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🙂
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And beyond Texas better yet?
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Yes! Immeasurably. Maturity helps (I confess to growing up a tad in the past 43 years, though it’s been a struggle at times), as does circumstance!
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I used to live in Oklahoma and ran away screaming. Can not pay me enough to visit the midwest – especially now as I live in the PNW.
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I understand. If you had told me two years ago that I’d be living in Indiana I would have laughed. 🙂 But I like it here.
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I’m glad you like it there 😊 You did write an accurate poem about Kansas tho… evoked my Okla memories entirely too well! Lol!
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Ha! It certainly was the Kansas I remembered.
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Having driven through Junction City, KS, on multiple occasions I must say you’ve painted a perfect picture of the place.
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It was pretty bleak, especially compared to Naples, Italy. I don’t think Walmart was there yet. The big place in town was a Gibson’s Discount Center.
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